


I'll Regret It Along The Way

by Juiceduck



Category: Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: English is not my native language sorry, I really love superheroes, I won't put any trigger warnings even if it may be triggering, It sounds weird and you're right, M/M, Mutant, Pete Wentz is a small jock, Superheroes, Superpowers, Supervillians, Their ages are fucked up, cool old lady is in this story, everything is awkward, he think he's an emperor, i should stop talking in tags, i suck at descriptions okay, im too shitty for this, my sister made her, that sounds ridiculous, this is really messy im sorry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-09
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-09-23 04:56:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 60,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9641606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Juiceduck/pseuds/Juiceduck
Summary: Mutants aren't something to be classified as normal in the world, but in the small, suburban town of Westlings there are a bunch of high school boys who all are born with different super powers. Some of them are outcasts, others are popular people whom everyone adores. Some are friends, some are not. Some are gay... most of them are gay.Something they all have in common however are their superpowers, and alongside their old, cool, art teacher they try their best at learning their powers properly - and not setting things on fire or accidentally starting thunder storms.A - slightly - dysfunctional team consisting of a redhaired coffee addict, his (cooler) little brother and said little brother's new friend, two cool afro dudes, cute gnome and his annoying friend dumb gnome, a guy with a big forehead, an oracle (not really), bob the builder as hulk, a cool looking dude with a surprisingly kind voice and last but not least, the two best friends who claim they are not gay.Mutants were never known for being normal anyways.





	1. My Mom Does Not Like Pete Wentz

**Author's Note:**

> wow this is a clusterfuck my fren go easy on me oky thnks

"We're going to be late, Gerard!" A very familiar voice shouted as they banged on the door. The redhead only buried himself deeper between his sheets and covers, and yelled some profanities on how he didn't want to go up just yet. Mornings were really the worst, having to go up just to get to some shitty place with even shittier people. Who would willingly go to school anyways? If Gerard ever met someone who did, he would be sure to send them to another dimension. Okay, he wasn't really capable of sending them to another dimension, but if he could he would have done it. Maybe he'll create a time portal and push them into Africa or Asia. He'll be sure to do that.

After a few seconds of lying in his bed and entangling himself with the Batman covers, he decided to go up. He didn't want to miss more of school, and certainly not make it more miserable for his younger brother who got half of the shit that their parents were supposed to only throw at him. Gerard tended to be late quite a lot, despite trying his best to better himself. He was making progress, but very slow and barely noticeable ones.

He quickly changed into some dirty clothes which were lying on the floor and exited his room, almost slamming the door into his brother's face.

"Jesus fuck, Gee," Mikey said and brushed away some of his hair from his face. "Can you maybe be a little more careful next time? Anyhow Ray is going to pick us up so get ready in five minutes or so. Knowing Ray he'll be here at eight point blank."

"Why won't you let me drive you?" Gerard asked as the two started to walk down the stairs. The older Way was in great need of a cup of coffee.

Mikey snorted and rolled his eyes. "You and driving are not a good combination, y'know." When Gerard turned around to look at his younger brother, Mikey was pouting slightly, indicating that he wanted Gerard to either feel sympathy for him or that he was going to say something that would hurt Gerard that wasn't meant to hurt him. "You're probably one of the worst drivers I've ever met. You got a speeding ticket the very same week that you got your license. Mom and dad suspended it very quickly, but the day that you got it back you reversed into a tree. You weren't allowed to use the car for a month, and when you got it back you drove right into the principal's car. Mom and dad won't let you drive again, and certainly not without a license. Also, I don't want to die."

"You know oddly specific details about those days," Gerard said as they walked into the kitchen, a smile spreading out on his face once he realized his lovely - but very annoying - brother had already prepared the coffee.

"I was in the goddamn car, if you now may have forgotten," Mikey sighed as he jumped up on one of the counters, giving his brother a loop-sided smile as he watched him pour some coffee into the Rorschach themed mug. "Also, mom and dad bickered on and on about the event about a month later, and still say you're not allowed to drive a car for months."

"Why can't you get your own car then? I mean, you're old enough to get a license and free of problems - except for shitty school," Gerard said as he turned around to face Mikey. "When I was your age, I was dreaming on competing in street races, but we all know how that turned out." The brothers smiled at each other, and seeing Mikey genuinely smile made Gerard smile even wider. His younger brother usually didn't smile nor laugh much, so seeing him happy always made Gerard happy.

"I'm not allowed to get a car nor drive your currently trashed car, mom and dad think that I'll be as reckless like you are - which I just to point out, am not. Also, I am not quite old enough, no."

"Mikey, you are objectively hurting me," Gerard said as he dramatically laid a hand on his chest. "Also, they are absolutely right about not giving you a car. I would be the one to crash it."

After a minute or two of drinking coffee and mindlessly talking, they heard someone honking a horn outside their house. Gerard peeked out between the blinds, and saw Ray's magnificent car parked outside. He and Mikey quickly got their things and scrambled out of the house, the younger one being forced to lock the door. The Way brothers had a little game going on; the last one out of the house would have to lock the door. Gerard always played a dirty game, pushing Mikey out of the way just so he wouldn't have to lock the door and get the front seat. The one in the front seat of Ray's car always got to chose what music to listen to.

"I see you're not playing by the rules today either," Ray said as Gerard threw himself into the front seat, shutting the door with a loud bang. "And carelessly closing my door. Mom and dad will notice some bruises on it if you continue."

"There won't be any bruises on a car from closing a fucking door, Ray," Gerard deadpanned as he put on his seatbelt, "Also, I do believe it would be a greater possibility for it to kind of fall off or the window breaking. Either one of them. And I would love to be present when that happens." Ray muttered something under his breath about how hopeless his friend was, but shone up when he heard a door in the back open and seeing Mikey sit down.

"Fucking asshole, you always do that," Mikey said to his brother, indicating the fact that Gerard pushed him. "We said no violence."

"That is not violence, my dear little brother," Gerard stated and turned around in his seat. "That is just mildly pushing you out of the way so that I don't have to lock the door. As long as no one is hurt, it is not violence."

"You pushed me into a table."

"Well, uh..."

"Are no powers allowed?" Ray asked, and the two brothers simultaneously shook their heads.

"I would travel through space and time to get here and Mikey thinks that's unfair."

"But it is!" Mikey whined, crossing his arms over his chest. "I would have thrown you into outer space..." he muttered, and Gerard gasped as if he was hurt by the comment. The two brothers continued to bicker as Ray only laughed at them, and started to drive to school.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

"Bye, kiddo," Gerard said as he pulled his brother into a bone crushing hug. "Don't try to do any sudden movements, we all know how that will turn out." Mikey muttered something incoherent but hugged his brother nonetheless, fully knowing that Gerard was fearing that he might accidentally reveal his powers as humans didn't take Mutants too well. The older one's was a little easier to hide, as a simple movement wouldn't make his power visible.

The brothers parted ways, and Gerard and Ray went to their lockers. Not that they had anything there, but their friend Brendon usually stood there as he waited for them in the early mornings of school. Unlike Gerard, Brendon was a morning person. And a night person. He was up no matter what time of the day, and Gerard even wondered if he ever slept. He himself had hard times falling asleep, but even if you messaged Brendon at 11 pm or 5 am he would answer. Maybe he had some kind of mechanism that if he heard some notice on his phone, he would wake up? Or maybe he had installed an auto replier? Gerard truly had to investigate that later.

"Hello my fellow gays," Brendon greeted them proudly, and both Gerard and Ray rolled their eyes at their friend's loud and excited voice. "I just found out that I, the amazing Brendon Urie, is free of any STD's. How amazing isn't that?"

"How amazing isn't it that you got laid?" Gerard asked and the three of them started to walk towards class. Brendon seemed hurt at the comment, and he started to babble on about how neither Gerard nor Ray even had kissed someone before. He even went as far to state that Mikey had gotten more action then both of them combined, and that's when Gerard decided to punch Brendon on the arm and push him down into a trash bin.

They walked into math class and sat down in the far back, obviously not to get as easily noticed by the teacher. Gerard liked to doodle in his books, and their teachers usually weren't so accepting of it. He was happy, and who cared if the teachers agreed or not as long as he was happy? Brendon was constantly on his phone - probably sexting - while Ray was the only one paying attention to the teacher. That was basically every lesson they had, together or not.

"I hope you did your homework or worked here in class, because today we're going to have a surprise test on this chapter," their math teacher, Mr. DeLonge said as he put down some papers on his desk. "I don't really care if you hate me or not, but this will affect your grade, only in the slightest however. If you manage to get a good grade on your big test but a bad one on this, I will rule out your grade here. If you get a good grade on both I will include this test result in your grade. A good student is always one to be credited."

"Ah, shit, I can't have been the only one who hasn't done their homework," Brendon glanced at his two friends with a desperate look, and both of them shrugged.

"Probably not," Gerard answered truthfully as he took out his pencil case. "I mean, me and Ray did it alongside my lil' bro but I'm sure there's someone here who hasn't done it. There are always those lazy people who think they can get away with everything and anything in this hell cursed world of satanic rituals that should just be banned from this godforsaken universe that I just-"

"Gerard, calm down," Ray said and laid a hand on the smaller one's shoulder. "No need to go all ballistic now, it's just Monday, at least wait until Friday. Mr. DeLonge is cool enough to ignore your grade if you just succeed on the big test. He’s not satan like Mr. Dirnt is.”

The two other friends nodded, and then continued doing their own thing until the test was handed to them. Gerard was quick to finish it, thank god he had a little brother who could look after him at times, Gerard was sure he would lie in a ditch, drunk off his ass otherwise.

Since the redhead had nothing to do, he decided to maybe play a little prank on his teacher. He put his hand under the table, made sure no one was watching him, and created a little time portal under his table. He also created one behind Mr. DeLonge, and put his hand through the portal by his side, only to see his hand pop out behind his teacher. He waved at himself, and almost laughed. He was so hilarious.

Gerard reached out to pull at his teacher’s collar, but just at that moment there was a knock at the door. He quickly retreated his hand and closed the portal, and to his relief no one seemed to have noticed his shenanigans. He was sure everyone would have freaked out if they saw a hand sticking out from some weird black hole. Yeah, Gerard did a mental note to be very careful when pulling any pranks involving his powers.

“Excuse me for disturbing your class, Tom,” their art teacher, Martha said as she opened the door. “Do you think I could borrow Gerard Way, Brendon Urie and Raymond Toro for an undisclosed amount of time? It’s pretty urgent.” Mr. DeLonge seemed confused at first, and then he looked down to the three boys sitting in the corner of the classroom.

“Uh yeah, you’re dismissed,” he waved his hand lazily at the three, and they quickly stuffed their things into their bags. They followed Martha out of the classroom, and Gerard saw another boy standing outside. He looked to be a Senior as well, and someone who Gerard would hang around as well. He was a little taller and bigger than Gerard, and looked at the three friends as if they were dumbasses. Which they were, to an extent.

“How about you follow me over to the Juniors? I have some people to pick up from there, and the Sophomores as well,” she said and started to walk, the four boys following her. None of them said anything to each other, mostly because all of them were thinking up scenarios in their heads on what they had done. Gerard was freaking out that someone maybe had found out about his powers, as both he, Ray and Brendon were Mutants. He was mentally scolding himself for using his powers in school. What if someone actually had seen him using it? What if Mikey had accidentally used his?

Gerard started to whimper quietly, and Ray seemed to notice that as he laid an arm around Gerard’s shoulders. Human contact could be good to get the redhead to calm down, but only by people he was comfortable with.

“What are we even doing? Like thanks for busting me out from my test but what?” Brendon broke the silence, and the other three boys turned to look at him.

“You’ll have to wait and see, just a few minutes because I have to gather a few other kids as well. Don’t worry however, your secrets are safe with me.” Those words did not help Gerard in the slightest, and he started to panic over the fact that his art teacher knew that he was a Mutant.

They picked up five other boys, none whom Gerard recognized. He liked one dude who had pink hair at least, and they complimented each other’s hair. Other than that it was pretty silent. Except for the pink haired guy and his friend who kept whispering things to each other. The three other boys were also talking, but not as much as the pink haired guy and his friend.

When they stopped at another classroom and Martha called out two names, Gerard felt his blood go cold. Frank Iero. The Frank Iero was going with them. The Frank Iero whom he met once in art class and still hasn’t said a single word to. Gerard barely knew the guy, only that he had similar music taste as himself and was incredibly cute. He had met him last year, when Frank had complimented his David Bowie drawing. The redhead - who didn’t have red hair back then, but instead black - had blushed madly red, as no one usually paid attention to him. They had never interacted since.

But at the same time that he felt his blood go cold with excitement, it was almost instantly gone as he heard the name Pete Wentz. He was quite an ass, and a slight psycho. Despite being a Junior, he felt like he had to pick on Senior Gerard Way, and he was starting to get really done with the younger one. Gerard hated school for multiple reasons, and people like Pete Wentz was one of them. What made it even worse was that Pete had a passion for music just like he did, and at times Gerard just wanted to give him something laced with cyanide. Or send him to Africa, which ever.

“What the hell are we doing here?” Pete questioned just as fast as he was out of the classroom. Gerard was already pissed at him.

“Just two more people to go, two Sophomores so be nice to them,” Martha said and they started to walk again. “Some of you may know who one of these are.” Gerard gulped at that, and clenched his fists behind his back.

“Do we all have supernatural powers or what?” Pete then questioned, and Frank lightly hit him on his arm. “Because like I, Frankie and Bobby are all Mutants and it wouldn’t surprise me if Way here was one either, considering how abnormal he is.” He grinned at the comment, as if it was funny. None of the others laughed though, they looked rather panicked. All of them knew that mentioning Mutants was very risky, whether you were one yourself or just a simple human.

“Pete, I think you should quiet down a little,” Martha said strictly, and this was the only time that she actually turned around to face them. “I won’t take any risks.” All boys went quiet, and then followed the old woman.

“Do you guys also have super powers?” Brendon asked the others quietly, and the others, one after one nodded. “Cool, we’ll be the new X-Men then!” Gerard hushed him as he got a little too loud, and then there was no more of that conversation. He was still paranoid over what she wanted to do to them, and if Martha had taken all of these Mutants, would she get his little brother too? Was she going to harm them, or help them? He knew that neither of his friends could really use their powers, and that it at times could go a bit overboard. Was she going to turn into Professor X? What powers did she know? Did she even know any? Was she working under the government? Was she planning on-?

“Gerard!” Ray’s voice broke Gerard’s spinning thoughts, and he blinked a few times and looked at his friend. He nodded forward, and Gerard saw Martha standing there with one familiar boy and one he had never seen before.

“Oh god, Mikey, you’re safe,” Gerard exclaimed and pulled his brother into a hug. “I thought that you were dead or something. Well actually I didn’t but that you were harmed or that you maybe had flung a pen into someone and somehow killed them or cut someone with a razor and-”

“Gerard, calm down,” Mikey said and softly pushed his brother away from him. “I haven’t done anything, and I am totally fine. Can’t say the same about you though.”

“Okay that’s rude,” Gerard said, but before he could continue scolding his little brother, Martha cleared her throat.

“I know that you two are very close, but we need to hurry to the art classroom,” Martha said and she speed walked over to said classroom. They followed her suit, and Gerard was starting to get tired of all the walking. But luckily for him the walk to the classroom wasn’t too long, and the boys were quickly hurried into the room. They were asked to sit down in the front of the room, and Gerard pulled Mikey over to the desk right into front of the teacher’s desk and sat down. Ray and Brendon sat down behind them, while the others sat down at random places.

“Well I guess all of you are wondering why you’re here, and I’m here to answer that,” Martha said as she locked the door. “You all have something in common, and I think all of us already know what,” she sat down by her desk, and looked all of them dead in the eye. “You’re all what most people call “Mutants”.” Gerard bit his bottom lip, and took ahold of one of Mikey’s hands. His brother’s hand was cold, and when Gerard glanced over to him he was biting his bottom lip as well.

“Now I understand this may come as a shock, and that all of you may wonder “why now”? I simply just now gathered every single Mutant in this school, and I’m surprised that it’s only boys, slightly disappointed too. I, however shall not grief over that, and shall simply learn you to control your powers.”

“Wow wow wow, hold on here a ducking minute,” Pete said and glared over to Martha. “This comes as such a fucking surprise, outta fucking nowhere and you just expect us to take this as if it was something that everyone goes through?”

“Yeah, like give us some more info rather than just “yeah let’s go train these motherfuckers whoo” or some shit,” Frank said where he sat next to Pete, and Gerard felt himself blush. Just hearing Frank speak made Gerard warm inside. He was totally whipped.

“Frank, Peter, please think about your language, I do not like cursing,” Martha scolded them, and while Frank looked down at the table as if he was ashamed Pete simply shrugged. Reason nr. 34 why Gerard Way likes Frank Iero better than Pete Wentz.

“Actually, cursing and swearing are two different things,” a small voice piped up next to Gerard, and all of the boys turned their heads from where they heard it. It was the other little Sophomore, the one who Gerard forgot even existed. He seemed to panic slightly when everyone looked at him, and he quickly disappeared. He seriously just vanished, as if he was swallowed by the chair he was sitting on.

“Where did the nerd go?” Pete asked, and he tilted his head to the side. Gerard felt like punching the guy, but as he was sitting a few feet away from him he was not capable to. Martha was also there, and so was Mikey, so Gerard didn’t feel like starting a fight. Maybe he was also kinda wimpy, and could never hold himself in a fight, but Gerard liked to blame it on the other factors.

“Patrick, I understand that you are slightly embarrassed, but turning invisible won’t solve your problems,” Martha said kindly, and slowly but surely did Patrick become visible to them again. Gerard was kinda jealous of him, he would have turned invisible multiple times if he was able to do it. Like whenever his parents felt like shouting at him, he would turn invisible for a while and then they could just search for him until he popped up. They would probably be more mad at him then, so Gerard decided that he was happy with his powers.

“So the purpose for us being here, is for you to train us?” Ray then asked, and Martha nodded. “But we all have different powers. I have invulnerability, while my friend Gerard has something that we define as time travelling.”

“I believe it is not time travelling, but time manipulation that he exceeds,” Martha said, and Gerard raised on an eyebrow. “I’ve seen you use it before, Gerard. Time manipulation radiates a lot of power, as well does telekinesis.” Her golden eyes met Mikey’s, and he squirmed slightly in his seat.

“How come they have such badass powers?” Pete asked nonchalantly. “I have this stupid fire thing which can set me on fire at anytime. One of my girlfriends even broke up with me because I refused to touch her because of my body overheating. It’s such a cockblock.”

“It’s called pyrokinesis, Peter,” she stated, and Pete seemed to taste the word as he mumbled it to himself. “It's the ability to manipulate fire at will, however you don’t seem to be able to control it very well. Not the most uncommon power, but your sort of it makes it more uncommon, being able to create fire. Most users are only able to manipulate fire.”

“Like Pyro from X-Men, but his powers are more precisely like the Human Torch.” Mikey said more to himself than anyone else, and Martha seemed to be a bit confused by his statement.

“He’s basically implying that Pete is more like the Human Torch as Pyro only can manipulate fire while the Human Torch can create too,” Gerard explained, and Martha nodded. She kept her eyes at the two brothers for a second longer than needed, but then she looked out at all of the boys instead. Gerard gave Mikey a wary look, but his younger brother didn’t seem to notice him checking him out.

“You’ll have to know that I may, or may not be able to help you out with your powers,” Martha said, and Gerard felt something sting inside of him. “Some of your powers are there less information about, and some more. It also varies from how much you already know and your mind. If you have a weak mind, your powers will probably be weak too.”

“Isn’t Patrick weak though?” Frank stated bluntly, and Martha gave the teen a slightly irritated look. “I mean, not that I know, but judging from his reaction from earlier when he couldn’t handle the fact that people were staring at him, shouldn’t he be weak? Just speculations. You also said that some of us “radiate” more power than others. What you meant by that, I have no idea.”

“She never said anything about any radiating power, dude, just that the nerd did” Pete said, and Frank gave him a confused look.

“You only thought that, right?” Frank asked, and Martha nodded. “Well fuck me sideways with a dildo.” Gerard had to stiffen a laughter at that.

“You know telepathy?” A guy with an afro not as cool as Ray’s, but an afro nonetheless, asked him. Frank squinted his eyes at the guy, and after a few seconds the guy jumped back as if Frank had scared him.

“Stop playing with his mind, Frank ,” Martha said, and the teen faced forward to her. “I do not want any sort of shenanigans between you. Please, stop discussing your powers for just one second and concentrate on other things. I’m trying to inform you on important things, that’s why you’re here in the first place. Be patient and listen.” Mikey huffed beside Gerard, and a smirk crept up on the older brother’s lips. Neither of the Way brothers had too great of a patience, but they both knew that they had to stand out with this. They barely knew anyone who actually accepted their powers anyways, especially not an adult.

“You all are what most people would call Mutants,” Martha began. “A Mutant is to be defined as someone with abnormal or supernatural powers that does not match with a human’s common abilities. There’s tons of different powers, and your are just a handful of them. Fascinating that none of you seem to have the same power. Some are also more common than others, like I mentioned earlier, Peter’s power is quite the uncommon one as he has a little quirk on it. I would say time manipulation and gravity control are the two rarest ones. Others like telekinesis and atmokinesis are quite uncommon too. Usually the powers that makes the biggest impact on the Earth itself are the rarer ones.”

Mikey raised his hand, and Martha sighed but nodded towards him anyways. “Are powers anything genetic? From what me and Gee know, mom and dad do not wield any powers. We do however.”

“It’s not genetic at all, it’s a mutation that happens when your mother carries you. The source to why the mutation happens is unknown. You two just happened both to contract it, which itself is quite rare. There’s about a five percent chance that your child will turn into a mutant, not that big as you see. However, if your first child is a Mutant, there’s a three percent chance that the next one will turn into one as well. It is not known why the chance gets lower, as the source of mutation is unknown, and research is still ongoing. I suppose you’re a little special, Michael.”

“Why must everything be so fucking complicated?” Pete suddenly complained and groaned loudly.

“It is not, Peter,” Martha said and he glared at her for using his real name for the millionth time. “I want to leave that however, and focus more on your powers. As we’ve witnessed earlier, Patrick is able to use his invisibility quite well. People like Gerard here can use his time manipulation to an extent, creating time portals does not seem to be a problem, while maybe bending time itself is harder. People like Joshua-” guy with pink hair, Gerard noted. “Has powers that gets affected depending on your mood, but as he progresses with them it will be easier to control. Peter’s powers will randomly active and hectic movements can cause Michael to use his telekinesis. Frank - as witnessed before - may not be able to tell the difference between thoughts and actual words. So some powers may be harder to control than others.

“How about you present yourself? Maybe it’s better than me just rambling up you and your powers, and weaknesses.” She laughed awkwardly, and then motioned with her hand towards the two supposed best friends in the corner of the room.

“Uh, well I’m Josh Dun. A Junior who likes to play drums..? I guess? And I also know at atmokinesis. I can change the weather at my will.”

“Hi, Tyler Joseph’s the name speed’s my game! Uh no not really, I’m actually pretty slow. I’m kinda awful at gym but enough of that. I’m able to control gravity but only to a specific extent. I’m pretty bad at controlling my powers but I love playing the ukulele which has nothing to do with my powers whatsoever. I’m also best frens with Josh, as you’ve probably noticed.”

“Okay will my name’s Joe, I do not meet the afro standards that that guy has,” he pointed at Ray. “I know super speed and that’s about it.”

“Andy. Teleportation. Junior. Vegan. Crossfit.”

“Uh, Mikey, this guy’s brother,” he nodded towards Gerard. “I’m a Sophomore who really sucks at math. I know telekinesis, which is the ability to move objects with your mind. I really suck at controlling it, but I guess that’s why I’m here.”

“Gerard Way, this kiddo’s big brother. I’m a Senior, I love comics, music and drawing. I know “time manipulation”, which makes me able to bend time I guess? I don’t fucking know, whatever.”

“I’m Frank Iero, the coolest dude you’ll ever meet. I’m like most people in this room a junior. I hate life at times but otherwise it’s pretty chill. I know telepathy so I can read your fucking minds ha.”

“Well my name’s Pete Wentz, I’m a Junior and I’m apparently pyrokinetic or whatever. Coolest dude you’ll ever meet is me but not Frank okay thanks.”

“I’m Ray Toro, nice to meet you. I have the power of invulnerability, which makes my skin unable to take any physical attacks. I’m a Senior and look forward into getting to know you all.”

“My name is Brendon Urie and I’m probably one of the most eccentric people you’ll ever meet. I know shape shifting, which means that this may not be my actual look, but I could have stolen it from some random person I saw on the street… Now it just happens that this is the real me so uhm… Nice too meet you!”

“I’m Ryan Ross and I can basically see into the future, also called precognition. It’s a pretty useless power but whatever, it can be exciting at times. I’m a Junior too… like everyone else are…”

“Bob Bryar. I don’t like anyone here so I would like to hurt you with my super strength, but my child friends Pete and Frank do not agree with me.”

“Eh, I-I’m Patrick Stump… I know invisibility… As you saw before… And uh…” The whole room was filled with an awkward silence, but Martha cleared her throat and directed the boys’ attention towards her.

“How nice, I really hope all of you will get along. I do not approve any sort of fighting, so if Peter here could try to refrain from any sort of violence I would greatly accept that.” Pete muttered at that and sunk lower down in his seat. Frank, who sat beside him, giggled slightly and Gerard thought he may just have been sent to heaven. Frank was just too perfect at times, even if he could be quite an ass.

“I do not in any way enjoy fighting, I don’t understand what you mean, Martha.” Pete said teasingly, and raised on one of his eyebrows.

“Of-fucking-course you understand, you dickwad,” Gerard said and glared over at Pete.

“Gerard, no need to be so rude. You have a little brother who looks up to you, y’know.”

“Yeah, and I don’t want you getting close to him.”

“Oh we might see about that. Your brother is way more attractive than you.”

“He’s a sophomore.”

“The younger the more innocent.”

“Okay that’s enough!” Martha roared, and the two bickering boys quickly turned to face the woman. “I do not want any fighting between you two, and no discussing your romantic interests. If I catch you two arguing over something silly like that again I will not hesitate to give you any sort of punishment.”

“Punish me, daddy,” Gerard heard Brendon whisper behind him, and he and Ray laughed silently at the joke. Gerard only clutched his fist under the table, and tried to focus on other things instead, like how cute Frank was when he talked to thy-who-shall-not-be-named.

“Now that all of you hopefully have understood that there will be grave consequences, I want to continue explaining everything to you, so please be quiet. I want you to know that if you want to become better, all of you will have to train. Some of you have easier controlling your powers, while others have it harder. I may not have any of your powers, but I believe I know enough to help all of you out. You’ll have to know that those who can’t control their powers at all will have to get more help than those who can control them.

“The other reason on why I gathered you here is to let you know, you have a threat in this world other than humans. There are as you know Mutants, however, all Mutants aren’t exactly nice. Some of them want to “take over the world”, control the human race and make the peaceful Mutants their slaves. I want you guys to be able to protect the human race, and not turn into the other Mutants’ slaves. It sounds extreme and quite weird, but the Government have told this information to experienced Mutants, and gave them the mission to tell inexperienced Mutants.”

“So you mean, the Government is involved in this bullshit? Where the fuck have I landed again, some B-comic book?” Pete said, and he was really starting to get on Gerard’s nerves.

“It’s not the Government that you are familiar with, but another one consisting of Mutants. They’re looking after every single Mutant in this world, good or bad. They’re checking to see into the database everyday to see if someone has died, or been born with a very rare power. I believe Gerard and Tyler are under the supervision of them, as time manipulation and gravity control are both very rare. Others like Joshua, Peter and Michael are also under their supervision as their powers can greatly damage someone without any intention.”

“Okay but, that is so creepy,” Tyler said, and glanced at Gerard. “I’ve always been afraid that the Government was spying on us ever since the NSA files conspiracy. Uh, I’m still shuddering.” Gerard was glad he wasn’t the only one worried over what the government did. Mikey believed in things such as aliens, but not any of the other stuff. The two brothers did have some differences after all.

“They’re not really spying on you, Tyler,” Martha informed him, but he didn’t seem convinced to the least. “You could say that they are checking up on you, just feeling like they want to know what you’re doing, and hopefully not destroying something.”

“Pete once burned down an abandoned house,” Frank said, and his friend whacked him on his head.

“I do indeed know that, the Government informed me and told me to keep an eye on you,” Martha said, and Pete buried his face in his arms. “They ruled it out as an accident, the damage didn’t seem to be intentional. I hope it was not, otherwise the Government would have taken care of you, Peter.”

“It’s not like it was intentional!” Pete started to protest, but it didn’t seem as if Martha thought it was his fault. His powers weren’t the easiest to control, creating and stopping fire had always been hard, according to the data files.

“I do not believe it was your initial intent, Peter,” she said and smiled at him. “Leaving that behind; I want you boys to return here after you have finished school. I apologize to you who have to wait, but I want to speak to you again. If you’re not available to do that, I would want to speak to you another day. Are you all free today?” One after another, the boys nodded. “Great! Come back here later then!” She smiled at them, and Gerard felt something warm inside of him.

He was going to learn to control his powers, something he had wanted to do for a long time. His little brother wouldn’t have to worry about accidentally flinging something away, and he was going to meet Frank Iero more. The only minus about it was Pete Wentz, he ruined everything.


	2. When Mikey Met Patrick (Totally Not A Movie Reference)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> my mom doesn't like pete

Mikey Way had in no way control over his powers. He was self-certified awful. His brother had figured out how to control his powers, and even how to open time portals. He could blame it on being the younger one, and not getting any time to practice, but Gerard knew how to control his when he was around the younger Way’s age. Either Mikey was just really damn awful with his powers, or Gerard was a God. It could be both, but Mikey hoped it was the latter.

The youngest Way was sitting in class, not giving a damn about Mr. Armstrong’s words as he spoke about some old, dead man called Julius Caesar - okay, Mikey did know who he was, but he just didn’t care. His mind was revolving around the meeting with Martha, and the upcoming one later on. He didn’t share the history class with Patrick, but Mikey believed he may shared English with him. If he did, he would make sure to sit next to the short boy.

Suddenly, the bell rang and broke Mikey’s thoughts. He quickly gathered his stuff, throwing them into his bag and not giving a damn about his teacher’s words on an upcoming test. Maybe he should have, but as mentioned before, he didn’t care in the least.

With earbuds in his ears and music on the loudest volume, he made his way to his locker. He put his things into it, dropping one of his folders where he had his English papers. He groaned loudly, and when he turned around to pick it up, a familiar face was right in front of him.

Mikey let out a squeal, and the boy grinned at him. The blond ripped out one of his earbuds, and raised an eyebrow at the guy as to ask for his business. “What do you want, Peter?” His voice was laced with venom, mostly because of the torture the man had put his brother through.

“It’s Pete, dear Michael,” he said and picked up the folder. “And I suppose this is yours? A demon on it, how… wonderful?” He laughed, and Mikey snatched the folder from him, turning back around to hide the faint blush on his cheeks. The demon was one that Gerard had drawn about a year ago, and Mikey knew that it was one filled with his brother’s hatred for people. The word “odio” was written next to it. If he remembered correctly, it meant “to hate” in Latin, or something similar. But for all Mikey knew it could mean pig too.

Pete leaned against the locker next to the taller male, and he looked up at him. “Are you interested in doing something later?” Mikey sneered at that, and rolled his eyes. “Or we could not.”

“Yeah, exactly,” Mikey said and closed his locker. “I really don’t give a fuck about you, but as you’re quite rude to my brother I don’t want to associate myself with you.”

“Aw, come on. You can’t judge me because of that,” Pete tried to reason, but Mikey only raised on an eyebrow, unamused. “Okay well maybe you can, but you only know the bad side of me. I have a nice side too, I swear.”

“Well maybe you do, but why would you be interested in me anyways?”

“You’re hot?”

“Well there went your chances down the drain,” the younger one turned around and started to walk in the direction towards his classroom. Pete didn’t seem satisfied with that however and walked after him. His legs weren’t as long as Mikey’s, but he could take quick steps, he knew that going in soccer would pay off one way or another.

“Isn’t it shameful to be dating a Sophomore anyways? Aren’t you the Pete Wentz, the guy who only dates popular people because he’s popular himself? I’m literally a nobody so get the fuck away from me,” Mikey turned down a corner, and Pete followed him, despite that not being the way to his own classroom.

“You’re just a year younger, and it’s not like you look like that Pat-something,” Pete said, and Mikey only looked down at him with a stone face. “If you date me, you will turn popular. Then there won’t be any problems for anyone of us! Seriously, I’m recommended to date. Like I have this huge di-”

“Pete!” A girl voice yelled, and the two guys stopped up to turn around. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” A girl with blue, long hair was stomping towards them, an angry look on her face. She grabbed Pete by his college jacket and pulled him down to her height.

“Ashley, hey,” he answered nervously.

“Are you hitting on this poor guy? Oh my god, Pete, what the fuck are you thinking? You just broke up with Meagan for like, four days ago and you’re already onto a new person. Fucking great,” she quickly turned to Mikey. “I apologize, little one, this guy’s a fucking nutcase and really, he’s a confused little dick.” She then decided to pull Pete away, and her bickering became quieter the further away they got from Mikey. He decided to go to class as fast as he couldn't see them, and hurried to his classroom.

When he arrived the classroom was almost filled with students, and his teacher not so subtly glared at him. Mikey ignored that however, and found Patrick in the back of the room and decided to sit next to him. The smaller male almost jumped out of his skin as he saw the blond, but immediately relaxed when he realized it was Mikey.

“You don’t mind if I sit here?” The taller male asked, and Patrick shook his head. Just as Mikey sat down, their teacher started to talk, leaving no space for the two to speak to each other. The lesson rolled on in silence, as the students were assigned worksheets that they were supposed to work on individually. Mikey had decided to put on some music then, and Patrick seemed to be pretty engulfed in his work. He noticed however that Patrick gave him some occasional glances, and it had started to annoy him.

“Do you have anything to say, Patrick?” Mikey whispered, and saw in the corner of his eye that the other one jumped slightly.

“Uh, well I was just… not to sound weird or anything,” he mumbled and looked down at the table with a shaken face, as if someone just had scared the living shit out of him. “I was just watching your hands.. they’re quite bony.” Mikey was slightly weirded out by the statement, but looked down at Patrick’s own small slightly chubby hands.

“Of course,” Mikey thought, and started his music again, turning back to the assignment. “Everyone has their own little faults.”

The lesson ended faster than what Mikey had wanted, but he finished the assignment right on time, and handed it in to Mr. Quinn. He was just about to walk out of the classroom when he felt some kind of weird feeling in his body, and he turned around to see Patrick still sitting by their shared desk. Even on a great distance, Mikey could see that the boy was trembling slightly, and so he decided to wait for Patrick by the door.

“Are you okay, Mr. Stump?” Mr. Quinn asked, and the small boy looked up at his teacher and the remaining student in the room.

“Eh, well I just happen not to be quite finished, I’m sorry,” he mumbled and started to fiddle with his pen. He was obviously very nervous about that for some reason, and Mikey really understand why. Mr. Quinn had said it was alright to take the assignment home if you needed to, but to have it finished for the next lesson. It wasn’t like you would be executed if you didn’t hand it in on time, but in Patrick’s mind it could probably mean that.

Mr. Quinn chuckled and told Patrick to finish it until the next lesson, and the short boy nodded as he got up from his seat and packed everything into his bag. He strutted over to Mikey and said his goodbyes to Mr. Quinn and the two exited the classroom. It was not until now however, that Patrick questioned why Mikey was waiting for him.

“I suppose your next period is lunch, if I’m right?” Mikey asked with a slight raise to his right eyebrow. Patrick nodded, and the taller male gave him what could be described as a smile, but it was so faint and short that it could just have been some twitch in his lips.

“Then you want to sit with me at lunch? I don’t share this lunch period with my brother nor his friends, sadly. I usually sit with them, but otherwise I’m pretty alone. I like sitting by the small table in the corner, because everyone have these huge group of friends who just can’t seem to fit there, so no one sits there. It’s also known as the loner table, so I guess I kinda fit in there,” Mikey let out a low chuckle at his statement, and Patrick felt his face heating up. How the hell could a damn laugh make him blush? The world may never know…

They accompanied each other to their respective lockers to put their things in there, but just as they were about to leave Mikey’s locker and go to lunch they heard someone yelling out his first name. Mikey cringed slightly, but stopped in his tracks.

“Michael, you off to lunch period or what?” Pete asked as he rolled up to them. Mikey only gave him a slight grunt as a response, but when Pete looked over at the shorter one of them he nodded as a confirmation. Mikey really felt like punching both of them, but he knew that he wasn't able to. First of, he would never hurt anyone, and especially not Patrick. Maybe Pete. Second of, he’s weak as a butterfly. Literally, he’s just skin and bones. Thirdly… well you just don’t punch people for some reason. Mikey truly never understood, you can throw insults at people but not punch them. Truly letting the physical sort of abuse out of the family. His thoughts were truly getting controversial he noticed, but his thoughts were pretty much any and every fucked up thing you could think of mushed into one thing, just like his humor. He was pretty fucked up in general.

“Mikeyway to Earth, Earth to Mikeyway,” Pete yelled in his ear, and waved a hand in front of his face. “You brain dead, dude? Seems as if someone took out a plug in your brain.”

“I might as well be, I know for a certain that you are erasing some of my brain cells for every time you say something,” Mikey said without looking at the shorter male, who pouted at the words and muttered “rude”. Patrick giggled beside them, but decided to stay low. He didn’t want to be involved with Pete Wentz, the biggest dick in the school. He might as well have the biggest dick, or at least according to some rumors. Patrick tried to stay away from those.

The three of them walked into the cafeteria, or Mikey and Patrick did as Pete was kind of stalking behind them. It seemed as if he wanted to keep an eye on the two, but still hang out with his friends. Two much unknown jocks were walking on each side of him, but Mikey didn’t particularly care, it wasn’t like they were gonna beat him up anyways. Hopefully… maybe they would just… walk on the back of their shoes? Mikey had to admit it was very annoying, but it’s not like it happened and there was no sign of anyone doing anything harmful against him or Patrick. So why did he worry so much then?

“I really don’t like cucumber,” Patrick suddenly said, and Mikey gave him a confused look. They were standing in the food line, and were currently at the vegetables. “Like, they’re mostly water with a bad taste, why would the world even think of growing such a thing? God, why would you give us such a thing?” Mikey was slightly amused by this, as Patrick seemed to be more at ease than earlier.

The two got their food and sat down at the table that was almost assigned to Mikey. It’s not like he was bothered by it, he was actually quite happy because of it. At least he wouldn’t have to sit at a table in the middle of everything and look miserable.

“So what do you think about this whole thing about our powers and such?” Patrick asked, and Mikey shrugged carelessly. “I’ve known about them for the longest time ever. I know Gerard had them when I was younger, but it wasn’t until I was around ten years old that we realized I had them too. Mom and dad don’t know about it, they’re pretty open about the whole disgusting thing revolving Mutants. Yet they’re super glad that Gee managed to come out to them, fucking hypocrites…”

“Oh, I apologize,” Patrick said, but Mikey just gave him a - fake - lopsided smile to say “no worries”. “My mom knows about my powers, and she tries her best to help me. She’s incredibly supportive, but my siblings don't know about it. Being the youngest out them, I know they would support me, but I’m just too scared to tell them.”

“I feel ya, dude,” Mikey said and just as he was supposed to say something, his phone buzzed. The screen lit up and it was a notice from Instagram, apparently @pweezy had started following him and sent a DM. Mikey however, being the intellectual he is, decided to ignore the boy.

“What was that?” Patrick asked curiously, but Mikey only brushed it off as some random notice from some app. The two continued on talking, with the occasional buzzing from Mikey’s phone which they both tried their best at ignoring. Patrick was mostly wondering what kind of app that sent out that many notices, or maybe Mikey was very popular on the Internet? Patrick then suddenly spiraled into an inferno of wondering if Mikey had Grindr, and then into what pictures he would post. That itself spiraled into some inappropriate pictures of Patrick’s new found friend(?) and he shook his head as if shaking the thoughts out of his mind.

“Are you okay?” Mikey asked, and Patrick felt himself blush mad as a tomato as the boy in front of him slowly pushed a carrot in between his lips. “Are you sick? You’re red as my brother’s hair…”

“Oh no, I’m just a little fidgety, maybe a little warm, it’s hot in here.”

“Dude, it’s fucking cold and I’m wearing a hoodie.”

“Maybe it’s because I’m here.”

Mikey turned around and saw Pete hovering over him, eyebrows raised slightly and a smirk placed on his lips. “Because, I’m so fucking hot. Don’t you agree, Mikeyway?” He ruffled the blond’s hair, and then walked away as if nothing had happened. Mikey mumbled something under his breath about how stupid Pete Wentz was and ran a hand through his now messy hair.

Patrick giggled slightly, and the two continued a normal conversation. After eating up, the two parted ways, as they had different lessons. Patrick had apparently been interested in choosing music instead of art, which Mikey chose. Mostly because his brother pressured him into taking it, but he did enjoy it too. He had chosen music as well - again thanks to his brother - but not at that exact time.

The door was unlocked, and so Mikey decided to trudge in. Martha was sitting by the front desk, and she gave the boy a smile which he faintly returned. He wasn’t necessarily known for smiling to anyone, rather much the opposite.

“I hope your day has been okay,” She said as Mikey took a seat in the front row.

“Well it’s been okay I guess,” he said and sat down in the chair, taking out his pencil case from his bag. “I sat next to Patrick in English, and then we ate lunch together. Oh, and Pete was also trying to hit on me, but I’m not too interested.”

“Are you even interested in the male gender?” Martha asked and Mikey felt slightly awkward being asked that. He had never really thought of his sexuality as something that mattered, as both parents mostly cared about Gerard’s sexuality he felt like he somehow didn’t have to be bothered by it. Their parents always saw him as the golden child in the family, and the older Way as the… messy emo teen? Their parents had obviously chosen sides on who their favorite son was, but all it did to Mikey was making him feel pressured.

“I don’t know? Like Gerard is gay so it’s a lesser chance for me to be too, but it’s like I don’t really give a fuck? I dunno it’s all very weird,” Mikey wondered to himself why he was spelling this to a woman whom he barely knew. All she knew about was that he had powers and an older brother who was a thousand times better than him at drawing.

“It’s okay to be confused,” she simply said and then continued in sorting around her papers. The room fell silent and Mikey decided that it was the time to listen to some music. The classroom soon filled up with more students, and after about fifteen minutes everyone were gathered and working on their drawings. Mikey was working on a piece of Freddie Mercury, but according to him it pretty much looked like shit.

The class went by swiftly, and as everyone was supposed to leave Martha asked Mikey to stay after class. The teen was slightly ticked off at this - he had totally ruined his drawing and it had gotten him into a sour mood - but decided to stay nonetheless. After every other student had left the classroom, Martha closed and locked the door. Mikey was beginning to get some stranger danger creeps on him, having read too many scary stories in his childhood years.

“I just wanted to talk to you about your brother,” she said and just like any other dumb teacher, leaned against her desk. “You know that Gerard may be better with his powers, and have been blessed with a very rare one at that, but I don’t want you to feel worse because of that. I’ve noticed during the time that I’ve been investigating you two that you are inevitably close, and it seems as if you look up to your brother a lot. I just don’t want you to compare yourself with him. You’re both unique, and it won’t do any good if your pressure yourself to get to what you see as Gerard’s level. You excel in things that he doesn’t.”

Mikey scratched the back of his neck awkwardly. He was feeling uncomfortable under the gaze of the old lady, and especially talking about how he indeed was feeling worse than Gerard. Not that he would ever tell anyone about his feelings other than Gerard, but since the topic itself was about the redhead, they had never spoken about it earlier.

“Why are you talking about it now though?” Mikey asked, and Martha almost seemed surprised at the question. “Is it because Gee is more of a special snowflake than me? Because I don’t really care that much, I suppose it’s better that he’s the wonder child, because then “the Government” won’t have to pay as much attention to the lanky stick that is me.” Martha chuckled at that, but only shook her head. Not in disappointment, but rather in amusement, which confused Mikey slightly.

“Michael, just because your powers aren’t as rare as your brother’s doesn’t it mean that the Government won’t have an eye on you. Alongside Pete, your powers have been proven to be two of the more destructive ones. Gerard and Tyler’s powers are very hard to get a grip on. Gerard’s powers have not been researched enough, we do know that he can travel through time but that it’s very hard. Tyler’s powers are possibly able to end the whole planet, but not before destructing himself into atoms, his powers are suicidal ones. You, if strong enough, can be able to lift up to whole towns.”

“I would never be able to do that,” Mikey mumbled and looked down at his hands placed in his lap. “I’m not strong enough.”

“Not yet,” Martha said and gave him some sort of suspicious smile. You know the ones that those scary fairy godmother can give as if they know something you don’t. It creeped Mikey the fuck out, and as seconds passed without either saying anything, the boy decided to get up from the chair and out of the classroom. A creepy feeling was still lingering around him, as if some ghost was haunting him.

The rest of the day went smoothly, sadly without any encounters with Patrick and happily without any encounters with Pete. As Mikey was standing outside of the art classroom - okay, he was sitting down, leaning against the wall next to the door but whatever - a familiar face looked down at him.

“So you were the first one to arrive?” he asked, his fro bobbing slightly as he made his way towards the youngest Way. Mikey looked up from his phone, and his eye’s met with Ray’s. The taller male almost seemed to blush a little as the two locked eyes, but Mikey only brushed it under the rug.

“Yeah, been sitting here for a few minutes, I’m pretty fucking bored,” Mikey said and shrugged. Ray sat down next to him.

“Pete Wentz? I see…” Ray mumbled, and Mikey felt himself blush slightly as he turned off the phone. “Didn’t know you were interested in him…”

“I-I’m not…” Mikey stammered as he pulled at his hoodie’s sleeves, covering his hand slightly more. “He’s the one who’s interested in me, I wasn’t the first to follow. He began actually, he DM:ed me and then I just felt guilty for not answering him and then we started chat a little but I decided to ignore him later and then-”

“Mikey, calm down,” Ray said and laughed. “I’m not mad at you for talking with him, I’m not like Gerard is. Although, I don’t really agree with you talking with him, Pete is known for a variety of things and most of them aren’t necessarily positive, so I just want you to watch out. Okay?”

Mikey buried his face in his knees, and groaned quietly. It was annoying when Gerard was lecturing him about not talking to strangers online, but it was awkward when Ray was telling him not to speak to “strangers” online. It was as if your parents were going to have “the talk” with you. At least Mikey didn’t have to go through that, he learned enough from the Internet.

“Are you pumped for the meeting?” Ray asked, and Mikey looked up at him with a tired face expression.

“No? I mean, I spoke to her again after our meeting between all of us, but she just kind of told me not to be jealous of Gee,” Mikey said and ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t get it really, she’s being oddly creepy. I don’t really trust her if I'm going to be honest. I mean, she’s never shown any interest in me outside of the fact that I’m Gerard Way’s little brother. And how come she’s only now noticed us? Are her powers that fucking awful or what?” He was obviously frustrated, and Martha was not someone Mikey was going to lay all his trust to. Despite telling her how he felt and feeling at ease then, afterwards was just dreadful.

“Seems like both you and Gerard have some trust issues,” Ray’s eyes were almost digging themselves into Mikey, as if he wanted to hypnotize him. “I believe that Martha is just a nice old woman, and maybe had a hard time gathering all of us. I have no idea why it took such a long time for her to gather all of us but I suppose there’s some kind of meaning behind it. We can ask her, if you’ll feel better?”

“Maybe, I dunno,” Mikey mumbled, voice small. “Thanks though, it means a lot that you care in the slightest.” A small smile spread out in his lips, and Ray flashed a bright smile back at the boy.

They sat in silence for a short while, until Tyler and Josh arrived and the four of them started talking. Mikey learned that they were in a two man band, and that they've been friends for longer than they could remember. Their friendship had apparently bloomed even further when they got to know about their respective powers, and they’ve been inseparable since then. 

It made Mikey think of his and Gerard’s relationship, and how Gerard used to play around with his time manipulation and steal cookies from the shelf that was too up high for them to reach. Sometimes it would be a total failure, as ten year old Gerard couldn’t properly use his powers. They had to be very sneaky with it though, so their parents wouldn’t notice them stealing anything. It was back in the day when they thought it wouldn’t do any harm for their parents to see Gerard using it without stealing cookies. It wasn’t until that they heard about a little girl who had been brutally murdered because she was a Mutant, that they realized that they should stay low with their powers. Mikey realized he had powers when he was about nine, when he accidentally threw an apple in his mother’s face. He’s never gotten better at controlling his powers.

“I see you youngsters have arrived early,” a voice suddenly said, and all the boys looked up to see Martha standing in the doorway. “Come in, come in. I shouldn’t let you sit outside here, you could have knocked on the door if you wanted.” She returned inside and the four followed her suit. They decided to sit down by one table, Mikey and Ray on one side and Tyler and Josh on another. They continued in talking to each other, until Gerard and Brendon did an amazing entrance (Brendon fell to the floor as Gerard walked into a table, it was truly epic).

After some bickering and Gerard having to be restrained as not to teleport the table into another country, they all calmed down and sat down by random tables. Mikey shot his brother a worried look, but the older one only shook his head and gave him a light smile, turning back to Brendon. It was also then that Mikey noticed that Patrick wasn’t there, and he was about to raise his hand to notice Martha, when someone suddenly tapped his shoulder. He turned to his left, and let out a loud shriek but short.

“Oh god,” Patrick said as the rest of his body became visible to the other male. “I apologize Mikey, I really thought you saw me before. Didn’t realize I was invisible.” He gave Mikey a small smile, said a few more sorry’s and then sat down behind him.

Mikey was to say the least, quite shaken up, and he saw Gerard grinning at him from across the room. He also managed to catch Pete smirking at him, and sending him a wink before he turned back to his equally as gnome-y friend. Mikey blushed slightly, but as he saw the other three boys by his table giving him strange looks he looked down at the table.

Ray was about to ask how he was, when Martha started talking, going into greater detail about powers and the goddamn anatomy of a Mutant. Mikey was to say the least, not listening really. He was sure Gerard wasn’t either, as he saw the teen with a pen in his hand and intently looking down at the table. He was obviously doodling something on the table, as usual.

Martha explained how she had “the power to see others powers and their potential”. Mikey wondered why her power didn’t have a name, but everyone else’s did. It ticked him off for a while, and he tried to come up with his own ideas for it. He failed miserably however, and gave up only after the fourth name.

After about half an hour of explanation, Martha let the boys go, telling them to come to her art classroom after school the next day to dig deeper into their respective powers. At least there was something that Mikey actually cared about for once. They were allowed to go, and the two Way brothers quickly walked over to each other, ignoring their friends - or actually, Gerard’s friends and the two best “frens”.

“I just drew fucking masterpiece,” Gerard said excitedly pulled his younger brother to the desk where he previously sat. “I kid you fucking not kiddo it’s amazing.” Mikey understood it was something he was proud of, because Gerard was usually not that excited about his own drawings.

Gerard pointed at the drawing, a big smile on his lips. It was a boy being engulfed in flames as his face was falling off from the skeleton. One of the eyes were missing, and his hair was flying around him in the form of mere strands. Next to him was another boy, raindrops falling down in his face. He looked sad and miserable where he stood in the black abyss which Gerard had drawn behind him. When Mikey looked at his brother’s hands he noticed they were covered in graphite.

“They’re inspired by Pete and Josh,” Gerard whispered in his brother’s ear, making sure that no one would hear him. “It literally just flooded to me out of fucking nowhere, it’s great though. Sad that I drew it on the table though.”

“You’re not allowed to draw on the tables,” the two brothers turned around to see a boy who they thought would be Ryan, if they remembered correctly. The curly haired boy squinted his eyes at the drawings, and then they widened as if they were too graphic for him.

“Where did you get this idea from?” He asked Gerard, glaring into his eyes with slight madness shown in his brown irises.

“Uh, it just popped up in my head… It’s nothing serious, dude,” Gerard said, and he had to say he was greatly creeped out by the boy.

Ryan just gave the two brothers a scared look, until he broke their contact and speed walked over to Martha. He whispered something in her ear, and she looked slightly scared as well. She shooed everyone except for Ryan out of the room, and as the last person exited the door locked behind them.

“Okay, but what the fuck just happened,” Brendon asked, and the boys exchanged confused looks.

“He seemed triggered by Gee’s drawings that he drew,” Mikey said. “I don’t know, he looked panicked and said something to Martha.”

“Wasn’t that the guy who could see into the future?” Tyler asked worriedly. “I mean, what if he had some sort of vision or something? I have no idea what you drew dude, but from what I’ve heard from stories about precognition certain things can trigger certain visions. What did you draw?”

“Eh, well it was a guy who was on fire and melting away, inspired by Pete. The other one was another guy who stood under the rain but he was in a black abyss where nothing like that should be possible, inspired by Josh,” Gerard said and pulled a little on his red hair. “I mean they were quite graphic, the guy with the fire was melting so maybe he had some Vietnam sort of flashback?”

“You did drawings inspired by us?” Josh asked, eyes lightening up slightly. He looked amazed by it, definitely a contrast to Pete’s slightly creeped out face

“Hey, Frank,” Bob suddenly said, and the short male turned to his friend. “You think you can listen in on what they’re saying?”

“No, my telepathic abilities don’t reach that far. I need to see the person to be able to read their minds, and for all I know I could be reading someone else’s thought instead. I’m really fucking awful with my powers, as you may have noticed,” Frank said. He seemed a tad bit mad at himself for not being able to live up to the others’ exceptions.

“Whatever man,” Pete broke the silence which had been created between them all. “Let’s just go, we can see if we can get anything out from her tomorrow or some bullshit.” He laid an arm around Frank. “I’m fucking starving, let’s go to McDonalds.” And just like that, the three friends seemed to have forgotten just what had happened as they walked down the corridor.

“Well I guess we should be going,” Mikey said and looked at his brother and Ray. “See you guys tomorrow I guess.” He flashed them a faint smile, and Patrick grinned back at him, waving goodbye to him. Brendon yelled bye as Tyler and Josh said bye to them simultaneously, while the other two much unknown boys waved slightly at them.

Mikey was glad he had made some new friends, he really needed that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shitty ending to a shitty story and every little detail may mean something later on ;-)


	3. Frank Iero Is A Little Too Emo For His Own Good

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the comments! I really appreciate them, and I'm actually surprised this even got any good reviews (low self-esteem party eEEY).
> 
> Thank you :-)

Frank Iero really loved his best friend, Pete Wentz. They had been friends since elementary school when Pete poured some glue in a girl’s - whom Frank hated - hair. Frank had walked up to the boy and told him that he was cool, and ever since they’ve been best friends. Pete had been there for Frank when his mom and dad divorced, and Frank had been there when Pete was dand was having a mental breakdown over the fact that he was “fucked up”. They were truly a pair of friends that may didn’t seem like they would go together, Frank was like an emo and Pete was kind of a jock. They met Bob in highschool, and he joined the pair as the third friend, and together they made a sort of golden trio.

But despite Frank having an undying love for his friend, he could just be the most annoying person in the world. Like right now, as Pete was sitting on his bed, smoking a cigarette he wasn't supposed to. He knew that Frank’s mom wouldn’t agree with it, and he knew that his own parents wouldn’t like it either, but when he was at Frank’s he felt like it was his opportunity to let his senses free. It wasn’t like Frank agreed with what his friend did, but he couldn’t bring himself to say no to him. He knew Pete had a hard time at home, and his free space was either in school or at someone else’s house. And no one liked school.

“Man, thanks for letting smoke here, I know you don’t like it,” Pete said and blew out some smoke from his mouth, grinning slightly. “Holy shitty fucks,” that was new to Frank. “It feels so fucking good. You know, I’ve been longing for this, this one smoke. I’ve been going around in school the whole day, waiting for this cigarette. Thankfully I’ve been occupied today, or well kind of. You know Mikey Way? The redhead Gerard’s little brother? Yeah, that guy is fucking hot. Would totally fuck him.”

Okay, Frank was getting really tired of Pete.

“Dude, I don’t wanna hear you telling me about how you would fuck someone,” Frank said where he sat at his desk, math homework almost laughing in his face as if it was enjoying his misery. Of course, a physical object can’t be laughing at you, but Frank was thinking that maybe, just maybe he was starting to go insane. Wouldn’t surprise him if he was diagnosed with being a psychopath. Was that something you could be diagnosed with? If so, Pete was one.

“Frank, I wanna cuddle,” the small jock said, and Frank wrinkled his nose. “C’mere.”

“No dude,” the black haired boy said and looked up at his friend for a brief second before turning back to his homework. “You reek of smoke, and you know that I hate it when you smoke.”

“You smoke too.”

“I just don’t like it when other people smoke in my room, it’s disgusting,” Frank sighed and dropped his pen to the table, spinning around in his chair. “I literally just let you smoke because I felt sorry for you, and now I suddenly don’t, what a fucking surprise. You also need to do your homework, I don't want your pens and books all scattered on my bed without any meaning. Your parents will also contact my mom if you hang here too much without any progress on your work.” Pete groaned loudly, and threw his cigarette stump out of the window next to him.

“I hate homework,” he complained, and Frank was so close at throwing his mug at his friend. “I could be out somewhere and hang with my friends but no, I have to stay with you and do some shitty work.” He turned silent for a short while, and Frank was happy for that, because then he could concentrate on his own work. “Oh, where did the party go?” He sang lightly, but Frank threw an eraser at him to get him to shut up.

Pete actually kept quiet, and did his homework, something that surprised Frank. That wasn’t something that happened a lot, and Frank was grateful for that, Satan must have heard his prayers. Or maybe he heard his prayers but possessed Pete in some kind of form, or took his soul away from him. Frank had always wanted to be friends with Satan, he was a very edgy teen indeed.

The two friends continued with their homework for about an hour, which was when Pete started to get tired of working and sat and sang to himself. He didn't have the most unique nor best voice, but it was good enough so that Frank wouldn’t cringe over it. When people only had average voices and sang without any music, some of them really sounded awful. Pete wasn’t that however, maybe he wouldn’t fit as a singer, but maybe some backup vocals. 

Frank really had to concentrate on his homework.

Another half hour passed with both of them working furiously, and it wasn’t until a knock on the door was heard, that they stopped working. Frank’s mother, Linda peeked into the room to check in on the boys.

“Oh? You’re actually doing homework?” She said, sounding genuinely surprised at the two working boys. “I’m going to make some dinner, would you like to eat with us, Pete?” Pete looked up at the woman from his homework, seemingly thinking for a few seconds before he shrugged.

“I mean why not, you’re making it vegetarian, right?” He asked, and Linda smiled kindly at the teen.

“Of course, Frank here doesn’t eat meat either and I suppose you know that very well,” Pete nodded. “Be down in about thirty minutes, boys.” She closed the door after her, and after a few seconds of silence between the boys Pete broke it.

“Would still bang your mom.”

Yeah, Frank was really done with Pete.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Lying in his bed, phone close to his face, Frank was scrolling through his social media. He saw a post that his ex girlfriend had posted, it was one of those typical Tumblr quotes on how sad she was and how she was missing “him” - aka Frank. He knew she was going to get over it in about a week, because they’ve been together before. She was a nice girl, but a bit over the top at times. She was a good friend to him though, so Frank hated seeing her like that, but he just couldn’t care less. It was the fourth goddamn time.

With Misfits blasting in his ears, Frank stalked through the other Mutants’ Instagram accounts (Pete had apparently found them and sent their usernames to Frank). No one was necessarily exciting, and the only thing that Frank honestly found interesting was how Tyler and Josh’s posts always had their best friend somehow connected to it. He also noted that the redhead whom Pete bullied at times seemed to be very great at drawing and have a good music taste. So, Frank being the smooth fucker he is decided to start following the guy and his supposed friends.

“Sweet lovely death I am waiting for your breath,” Frank whispered for himself as he bobbed his head to the loud music in his earbuds. Despite it being 2am, Frank was wide awake as if it was in the middle of the day. He would usually get around three hours of sleep, and on weekends he would sleep about twelve hours. He knew he was going to die faster than what he would like, but after all of the times he’s joked about wanting to die, he guessed that karma wanted to be a bitch.

“Is anyone awake?” A voice suddenly echoed in Frank’s head, and he quickly sat up in a frenzy. “This is gonna be easy.” Another voice said. Frank ripped out both of his earbuds, just to make sure his phone wasn’t fucking with him. It was a pretty fucked up phone after all, he actually guessed it was haunted at times.

“Hopefully no one’s awake,” okay, Frank was sure that wasn’t his phone.

The small boy almost peeled the sheets off of him, and crept over to his door. He didn’t hear anymore voices, but instead some faint noise downstairs. Frank got goosebumps, but decided not to be a pussy - like Pete would have said - and slowly opened the door.

“I heard something,” a hushed voice said, and Frank stopped in his movements. It went quiet within the whole house, and the only thing Frank could hear was his own loud breathing. “I swear to fucking God, we’re gonna have to kill someone inside here.” The same voice echoed in Frank’s head, and suddenly he felt sick. He leaned against the door frame and started feeling lightheaded as well as having the need to throw up. 

Kill him? Who were these people? Where the fuck were they located anyways?

Frank closed his eyes and tried to concentrate his mind on nothing in particular. That was how he usually tried to track another person, something he had forced to teach himself. It usually required a lot of concentration, and silence. The boy wasn’t necessarily the most skilled when it came to controlling his powers. It was actually one of this few times that he tried to read someone’s mind without actually seeing them, and he was about 99.9% of the time unsuccessful.

A sudden sharp but quick pain hit Frank, and he winced. He knew it was because he was pushing his powers far beyond what he actually was capable of doing. So, Frank decided to walk a little closer to the stairs leading downstairs in hope of getting to know the location of the men without actually having to see them. He sat down at the top of the stairs, grabbing ahold of the railing and putting two of his fingers to his temple in a Professor X kind of way.

“I swear to god if someone’s here, it’s either gonna be the death of us or them,” the first voice echoed in Frank’s head, and he smiled smugly to himself. These fuckers were going to die.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing,” Frank signaled his thoughts to the mind which he had connected to, and right after that he managed to connect the second man’s mindset with his. Finally he could have a full blown conversation.

“I heard someone,” a man whispered from downstairs.

“Shut the fuck up, dude.”

“Put your weapons down, and stay still,” Frank sent his thoughts out, and he heard a noise sounding like metal hitting the tiled floor of the kitchen. “I do not want any violence happening, unless you propose any immediate threat I will not harm either of you. You can either retreat-” a loud bark broke Frank’s communication with the two men, and all of a sudden one of his dogs ran past him. He swore silently for himself, and dashed down the stairs after his dog.

He followed him into the kitchen, and the German Shepherd was barking at two men who were huddled in the corner of the kitchen. They were hiding next to the stove, a place where Frank used to play hide and seek with Pete, a sucky hiding place but it was fun hiding there.

Another, much smaller bark was heard behind him, and another pair of footsteps made their way down the stairs.

“Oh my god, my little baby,” Linda said as she ran to her son, engulfing him in a quick hug before she took their home telephone to call the police. King - his German Shepherd - was glaring his teeth at the two men, whose eyes were wide with fear. Sweet Pea, his little sweet dog, was also glaring her teeth at them but obviously with not as much effect as her partner.

Only a few minutes later, two policemen knocked on their door. Frank opened for them, and the two of them followed the boy into the kitchen. The two burglars had started talking to Linda, but now she was restraining King. The two men were led out of the house by the policemen, and after some talk between the officers and the Iero’s, they left. They ruled it out to be nothing in particular, but that Frank and his mother should try to be careful and maybe come to the police station the next day.

As the two criminals were being pushed into the car, one of them started yelling about some godly voice talking in his head. He yelled at the teen for answers, but before Frank could even say anything the two men were pushed into the car, door closed. When one of the officers questioned Frank about what they meant, he answered about how he didn’t know.

There was no way in hell that he was ever going to say anything about his powers to anyone.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“Holy shit, you did that by yourself?” Pete’s loud, obnoxious and excited voice yelled in Frank’s ear. The black haired boy only groaned loudly and flung his locker door up in his friend’s face, whom he surprisingly hit, much to Frank’s amusement.

“Don’t talk about it so loudly,” Frank whispered as he took out his folders and books. He had told Pete about last night’s event, and his friend had been more than excited to hear about it. For some dumb reason Pete just couldn't seem to be quiet about anything for more than one second, and the habit was starting to get on Frank’s nerves. They may be best friends, but more often than never would they annoy each other.

“Sorry, just thought it was super cool,” Pete whispered. “Are you gonna tell the others though? Because like, Martha would probably like to know. You’re evolving with your powers after all, you couldn’t do all that shit until yesterday or at least not perfectly.”

Frank frowned at that. Should he really tell everyone? They were supposed to go together as a team, but he didn't trust anyone of them as lack of time communicating with them. They were all a bit too odd for his taste, and that’s coming from someone who’s friends with Pete Wentz. But it wouldn't hurt just telling Martha now, would it? But he didn't really trust her either, maybe he could tell Gerald, or whatever the dude’s name was. They seemingly had similar music tastes, and someone with a good music taste must be trustworthy. Pete didn’t have the best music taste though, but then again Pete wasn’t trustworthy. Pete really was a living embodiment of good examples.

No, Frank settled on not telling it for anyone other than Pete.

“Not necessary, they will probably know about the break in later by the newspapers anyways,” Frank stated bluntly as he closed his locker. “Word spread fast around here, y’know.” The two students walked to class, as they shared most of their classes, much to their teacher's dismay. No one wanted to deal with them together.

The school day went by quickly, but what constantly was on Frank’s mind was the police. He did tell the officers that he heard them when he was supposed to go to the toilet, so that’s what everyone will believe, it’s not like it wouldn’t happen. But it still bothered the small boy over that he had to lie, something that he didn’t particularly enjoy doing. What if the two burglars would start talking about hearing his voice in their head? Would they suspect him of telepathic abilities, or at least some Mutant ability? The two men could go through thousands of polygraph tests, and still it would say they were telling the truth. But you could trick it, as the tests weren’t 100% reliable. But still, Frank could be outed as a Mutant, something he’s feared for a very long time.

“Hey, Frank,” a voice broke Frank from his spinning thoughts, and he looked up to see Bob giving him a weird look. “We’re supposed to go for lunch, come on.” The taller male left his friend, and Frank quickly gathered his pens and papers. He had to catch up with Bob, who had way longer legs than what Frank did. He really hated being short at times, well most of the time. The majority of the time. All of the time.

The two friends made their way into the cafeteria. They took their food and sat down by their usual table, where Pete, Jamia (ex-girlfriend), Lindsey (ex’s friend) and Neil (another one of Frank’s kind of friends) also were seated. As fast as Frank sat down, Jamia got up from the table and walked away, even leaving her food behind her. Lindsey sighed at that, and gave the boys an apologetic look before she followed her best friend. Frank would truly never understand girls, sometimes he even wondered if it would be easier dating a guy. That’s what Pete had said.

“Girls, man,” Frank muttered as he stabbed his potato, making it fall to pieces. “I broke up with her for the fourth time, and she’s just as mad or sad or whatever as the first time. Like calm the fuck down, it’s not my fault that you were being a bitch and I needed to do some goddamn homework as I was sleep deprived. Just fucking learn from your mistakes not to get together with me.”

“Then why the heck to you keep saying yes every time she asks?” Neil asked as he lazily took a sip from his glass, spilling some of the water onto himself. If someone was tired, it surely was him and not Frank.

“You know that I can’t say no, that’s how my brain works for some reason. She looks so nice and sweet that it's impossible to reject her.”

“I can tell her to fuck off next time,” Pete proposed, mouth full with food which admittedly grossed Frank out a little. He only shook his head however, and told his friends that next time he would man up and tell her no. That would probably also break her heart, but if it was the last time Frank was willing to do it. It’s not like she would die, or would she? Could people die from a heartbreak? Frank was sure he had read something about it before, about how someone got so sad and died. Or maybe they got a heart attack, he wasn’t sure.

Despite having mind related superpowers, he had a really bad memory.

The boys continued on talking about random things, like music and sports as they ate their food. Frank lost his interest in the conversation when Neil and Pete started discussing last night's soccer match, and so he decided to scan all the students in the cafeteria, something he did when he was bored.

The disgusting light blue tables were all dirty, he noted, and the floor was covered with different stains of who knows what. Pete once said he “got down to the dirty” in the cafeteria, but Frank had a hard time believing that. But then again, it was Pete, and everything could be possible when it came to him.

Frank’s eyes then suddenly settled on one table, one where the familiar redhead sat. He was waving his arms around, a scowl on his face as he yelled at the blond in front of him. The others by the table only looked at them with amusement across their faces, and Frank would much rather have sat there. His friends were lovely little shits, but at times he really just wanted to have a relationship to his friends like those guys seemed to have. They all seemed to be fairly close, and it was something that Frank had wanted to achieve with his friends for a long time. Sure, he was uncomfortably close with Pete, but he was the only one, Bob and Neil were friends of Pete’s from the beginning and Frank wouldn’t even classify Neil as a friend. He only sat with them at lunch.

It was something that had bothered the short boy for a long time; he barely had any friends. He's always wished on having this medium sized group of friends of maybe four people and talking about bands and how shitty school was. But instead he got a weird mixture of teens in his school, and was quite the popular kid. He’s always labeled himself as an outcast, and at times he really wished he was one. Frank truly despised being friends with the popular kids at times.

The readhead - Gerard, Frank had realized his name was - suddenly looked over to his own table. Gerard’s eyes widened, and he seemed to freeze in his sentence as his lips were parted slightly. Frank gave him a little awkward wave, trying to be nice for once. Gerard surprisingly waved back at him, but as quick as he had done that he turned back to his friends who now also had turned their attention to Frank. The-guy-with-the-big-forehead waved enthusiastically at him, but that's when Frank decided it was enough and turned around to his own friends.

But he turned around only to see no one sitting there. Sighing tiredly, Frank got up from the table. He didn’t even bother throwing his trash away but only exited the cafeteria. Of-fucking-course his friends would leave him to try and go for a smoke or some shit, none of them cared for him anyways. He was just Pete’s friend, nothing else to them. Only a “pay for one get two” sort of deal, unwanted. Okay, he was friends with Bob, but not that kind of friends. Not that kind of friend that Frank wanted.

He already had his things in his bag, so he only went to the classroom where he was supposed to have Chemistry. It was another forty minutes until it would start, Tuesdays have a very long lunch break. 

Sitting down by the door, Frank took out his earbuds and plugged them into his phone. Music was always something that helped him in his worst situations, like now, when none of his friends were there. He hated being alone at times, and especially when he felt the need to talk with someone. Sure, he could always randomly talk to someone walking by, but Frank wasn’t that kind of person.

After twenty long agonizing minutes of waiting, and students giving him weird looks because; “where the fuck are his friends?” Pete emerged out of nowhere and sat down next to him. Frank wanted to pretended that he didn’t notice his friend sitting down next to him, but with someone like Pete you just didn't ignore him. And Frank was feeling extra clingy for some reason, God it was as if he was on his nonexistent period or something.

“We thought you went with us,” Pete said, and poured slightly. “Then all of a sudden you weren’t there. Sorry that we continued on without you, but we got a text from Gabe telling us that he had some you-know-what and we just had to go.”

You-know-what, was obviously directed to drugs. Frank wasn’t really into that stuff, as he knew it could majorly fuck you up. He stuck to smoking instead, still something harmful but you wouldn’t most likely get in trouble with the law as much as with drugs. Drug dealers were some scary shit, and everyone in the school knew that Gabe was the local dealer. Pete Wentz was the one who made him famous by buying some from his stash, and then spreading the word on how Gabe had drugs, and so every student in school knew where to get it.

“I’m going to the police station today,” Frank mumbled, and Pete tilted his head as if to ask for his friend to continue. “After the night’s break in they want to talk to me, but apparently they let me go to school. I don’t know man, Westlings* is a weird-ass town. The police are fucked up - well at least according to me, but maybe they just wanted the sweet, innocent little teenager to get his good night sleep. Fuck I hate the human race, y’know. Such assholes.”

“Frank, you’re turning too emo for your own good,” Pete teased him, but as Frank didn’t smile or anything he immediately changed approach. “You know they have some more important things to take care of. The burglars did destroy something that was your property, and broke into your house without your permission. They didn’t steal anything however, and I guess that’s why they put it in the “not so important things” case files or some shit. Last year they found me, Bob and a few friends smoking pot, and since I do not under any circumstances look like an eighteen year old with my height they took us into the station and phoned our parents. Mom was mad as fuck, do you remember that?”

Frank laughed a little, because yeah, he did remember it and from his perspective it was downright hilarious. Pete was forced to go to some stupid center for a whole month, which in turn was also kinda sad because Frank had no one to hang with and ended up not showering for two weeks and not leaving the house until Pete came back. But it was kinda worth it seeing his friend being physically exhausted for not talking to anyone who wasn’t “some disgusting little shit and/or a little twat”.

The two sat and talked about everything and nothing for a while, and Pete managed to distract Frank from talking about how much he hated humanity, something he’s had to stand out with for years.

The day flew by like a blur, and all of a sudden Frank was on the bus on his way to the police station. He had told Pete to tell Martha that he was going to be “interviewed or some shit haha”. Frank was awkward even around his best friend, yes.

He noted that some old lady in the seat on the other side of the bus was giving him weird side eyed glances, and it was truly starting to freak him out. Maybe she knew that he was a Mutant and was planning on murdering him? Or she hated teenagers. But it was a possibility that she thought he was a Mutant. It could also be the fact that he’s dressed in all black despite it being in late September, and still very warm.

“Weird kid,” Frank suddenly heard echoing in his head, and he realized he accidentally had read her thoughts. It stung a little, because no matter how many times he heard people say that or how used he was to it, it would always hurt a little. He was proud of who he was, and usually just put up his middle finger at everyone who thought anything negative about him. At times he would even transfer his rude thoughts to others, and they would look scared shitless as Frank only laughed on the inside.

The bus came to a stop, and Frank had been too deep into his thoughts to realize it was his destination. Thankfully, he wasn’t the only one who had to jump off here because other wise he would have gone off somewhere else.

The police station was about a kilometer away from the bus stop, and Frank sighed as he started to walk. He hated being out in public, because that would only mean more people giving him weird looks and judging him for how he dressed. Sure, he may had a sour face expression as he had his hands down in his leather jacket’s pockets, but angry people could be nice too. And it wasn’t like he was angry anyways, he just had some teenage angst in him. Didn’t everyone?

After a good few minutes that took way too long for Frank’s own taste, he arrived at the police station. When he walked in it was an empty place, only a woman standing behind a counter in the left side of the room. It was a pretty open space, with chairs lining up the wall to his left and another few to his right. If you went a bit further into the room you would get to a door, and another one was about a meter next to the first. It was quite the small station, but then again the town itself wasn’t that big.

Frank walked up to the woman by the desk, and told her his name. She gave him a worried expression, but told him to sit down and wait for a short while. He had no idea how things worked at a police station (maybe he should have asked Pete, he realized), but decided to do as you do at the dentist. It seemed to work at least.

“Frank Iero, I assume?” A manly voice suddenly spoke, and Frank looked up to see a buff man standing in front of him. He was quite attractive, but it all went down the drain as he pronounced his name "eero". At times he fucking hated his name, but it was better than people pronouncing it like Lero, everything was better than Lero.

The teen followed the man into the first door that apparently led into a corridor. There were doors lining up there, but the policeman went into the second one to the left and Frank followed. It was pretty much an empty room, except for a table and two chair. Papers were lying on the table, and so was something that Frank guessed was a recorder. It made him a little anxious, but he decided to put on a tough guy persona. As good as the 5’6 tall teen could at least.

The two sat down by the table, and the police officer explained that he was going to ask Frank a few questions as well as record their conversation. Frank was totally okay with that - not really - and the interview started off quick; what did you do the night of the break in?

“Uh, I was lying in bed, looking at my phone and stuff when I felt the need to piss,” Frank began, and he already felt the sweat running down his back. “When I got out of my room I suddenly heard some noise downstairs and decided to investigate it, I’m quite the curious guy. I barely got down the stairs when my dog - the German Shepherd, King - bolted by and that’s it basically.”

“But it was your mother who called us?”

“Yeah well only a few seconds after that my other dog came down along side my mom, and she hugged me for a second and then went to call the police. The burglars were too busy being scared of King… the German Shepherd.”

“Okay, but the two intruders told us they heard a boy’s voice in their head, one that was eerily similar to yours. Do you know anything about this?”

“No, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Frank bluntly lied, clutching his fists under the table. “I never said a word to them, I never shouted at them to stop or anything. A guy my size would never be able to take on two bigger men, no way. Maybe they thought they heard my voice? Like schizophrenia or something?”

The man wrote something down on the paper, and then looked up at the teen. “Do these men know you or the other way around?”

“No? At least I don’t think so, maybe they know me but I for a fact don’t know them at all.” Frank was trying his hardest to stick to the truth when it came to other things, as if he knew them. Sure, maybe he twisted the event itself but if he ever had to go through a polygraph test he would want to tell as much as he could of the truth. Frank, for some reason, thought that if what you said majorly was the truth, the polygraph test would lean onto you telling it the truth.

“Have you’ve ever been involved with anything criminal before?” The man asked.

“No.”

“Anyone you know who has been involved with anything criminal before?”

“Yes. But isn’t that quite irrelevant?” Frank really didn’t want to spill the beans about Pete, especially not more than what the police already knew.

“I suppose so…” the man mumbled, and Frank felt like his statement was being totally ignored.

“I heard that nothing was stolen, am I right?”

“Correct.”

“No one was harmed?”

“Nope.”

“Well, Frank there wasn’t that much we were supposed to ask you. Your mother will come back here later, and maybe we’ll have to speak to you again. I’ll escort you out of the room, thank you for your patience.” The officer stood up, and Frank followed suit. The two walked out of the room and the man almost shooed him out of the corridor and into the first room Frank was in. The teen almost bit back at him for being rude, but decided to stay quiet.

The receptionist gave him yet another weird look as he left the station, and he sighed as he realized he would have to walk back to the bus stop and wait for another bus. The meeting had been so fucking pointless, that the teen was sure that he could have skipped it and told his mother to go. But no, she insisted that it would be important with his testimony.

Frank was so done with everything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Westlings is my fictional town, as all of these bands live in different parts of the US, and I am not even from America (SWEDEEEN)
> 
> I have made errors here, I know. Bear with me, I know you can me it through my plot holes!1!1! This is also the first chapter I throughly correct, as I thought my friend was correcting it but apparently she wasn't. cri.
> 
> Next chapter will be Gerard, and probably through rest of the story too. You've gotten some introductions and there you have it~ no one reads the notes but on my stories it really helps :-))))))))


	4. The Chapter With Forced Plots And More Tyler Joseph

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Let's introduce the Way and Toro families :-)))))))

Concentrating on the portal in front of him, Gerard stuck his hand into it. It popped up behind him, as he accidentally touched his own back. The redhead may have moved his hand through the portal, but he’s never been able to move any bigger physical objects. So, Gerard stuck his other hand through the portal and felt that touch his back as well. Slowly but surely he poked his head into the portal, and his face lit up as he saw his own back.

Gerard may have great control over his powers, but he’s never been able to get any further in expanding them. He’s always thought it was just a little something, and that his powers were restricted to creating time portals. Apparently that didn’t exist, but time manipulation did, and time portals were a sub-power to it. Gerard had to say that he was impressed with his own power, but that he was pretty fucking useless at using it. Yes, he did research on it on the internet, but there was no help really other than pointing out what he could do.

Pushing his head through the portal and then continuing to push his chest and stomach through it, Gerard felt bliss go through his body. It’s scary seeing your own body leaning into a black hole, something he never thought he would be able to see. He saw his phone in the back of his pocket, and picked it up, taking a photo of his lower body in front of him.

“Gerard, dinner’s ready,” his mother’s voice spoke, and the teen froze in his position. He quickly pulled back from the portal, closing it at the same time. The first portal closed right in time after Gerard as he pulled his hands out of it, and right after that his mother opened his bedroom door.

“Why do you look so panicked?” She almost sneered at him, and Gerard frowned at her. “Dinner is ready, your brother is already downstairs. We yelled at you before but you didn’t come down. I don’t want that happening again.” At that, she turned on her heel and walked down the corridor. Gerard was left standing in the middle of his room, confusion and annoyance reeking from him. He was sure he hadn’t heard his mother’s voice yelling at him. Was he really that concentrated on his time portals? It certainly didn’t feel like it.

The teen shook his head, as if wanting to shake his thoughts of his brain, and quickly walked out of his room and down the stairs to the kitchen. His family were sitting by the table, and the chair to the right of his brother was free. The kitchen looked unnaturally messy, as pans were lying by the sink, and a clear, big food stain was on the wall where the stove stood. Gerard wanted to ask them about it, but decided not to, as a single question could lead to a full blown argument. It had happened before, and Gerard wasn’t too keen on starting another fight, so he only sat down next to his brother.

The family ate in silence for the first few minutes, but Mikey broke it, thankfully. “I got an A on my English assignment.” Their parents looked at their son with admiration, and started to praise him for succeeding with school. They only ever praised Mikey for his success, but he was usually the one who got the outstanding grades. Gerard landed with C’s and B’s, barely any A’s. When he did get an A though, they only said a “good for you, son” and then went into questioning Mikey. Gerard loved his little brother with his whole heart, he truly did, but at times he just wished he could get some attention himself. Well, when he actually had the attention on him it was because he had done something bad. Yeah, Gerard really despised his own parents at times.

“Have you heard about the break in at the Iero’s?” Donna asked, and Gerard’s ears immediately perked up. “Apparently the two men who intruded had heard the son’s voice in their head. I immediately thought that the boy was a Mutant, wouldn’t surprise me if he was. The police are disregarding this option however, stupid of them in my opinion. There are a handful of Mutants in this town, remember the old man who creeped outside of our house for about three years ago? He had x-ray vision and had apparently spied on us.”

“How come?” Gerard asked, eyes strained on his mother. He had never heard about that.

“For some rather explicit reasons,” she gave her sons a weird look, and then turned quiet.

Gerard almost felt his whole body go numb, because, when the fuck had this happened? He remembered seeing some old man outside of their house at times, and Mikey had even spoken to him. Gerard always had a bad feeling about him, as he seemed to be very down after Mikey would have to leave. The older brother always kept on eye on the old man, just to be sure he wouldn’t suddenly take up a knife from nowhere and slit one of their throats. The scary stories he told Mikey totally didn’t get to himself.

“Disgusting things these Mutants use their powers for,” Donald mumbled, and Gerard almost felt like punching one of his parents. All of the Mutants weren’t like that freak man, most of the people Gerard knew were actually rather nice - well the only ones he knew went to school, and he liked everyone there except for Pete. As far as Gerard could like a stranger, that is.

“I think we should kill every Mutant out there, or what do you boys say?” Donna asked and looked her sons right in the eye. Gerard’s rage was probably pretty visible, but he really felt like he should kick her in the face and then teleport her to Africa. He gushed a lot about teleporting people to Africa when he actually couldn’t do it, but he was sure to be able to learn it.

“Mom, I don’t think that’s unfair to the Mutants,” Mikey mumbled, and the family quickly turned their attention towards the youngest Way. “You know how we used to treat black people as slaves? You know how we said homosexuality was a disease? If we treat Mutants the way we treated the other minorities we’ll be no better than what we were years ago. Just because they’re Mutants who may do something wrong doesn’t it mean we should kill them. They should have the same rights as we do, it’s probably just a minority of them who use their powers to do criminal things. We’re no better than them. We-” 

A loud slap echoed through the room. Donald was leaning over the table, an enraged look on his face. Mikey looked like he would burst out in tears any second, and he softly placed his hand to his left cheek.

“Mutants are scum, remember that,” their father whispered, and Mikey nodded as his eyes began to fill with tears. “Go up to your room. Don’t come down here until we say you can. Think over what you’ve done.” Mikey nodded again as he quietly got up from his chair and hurried up the stairs.

Gerard was fuming with anger, and he was scratching his nails at his thighs. His parents acted as if nothing had happened, and just continued eating. How the fuck do they think they can get away with slapping his brother? If murder was legal, Gerard would have decapitated his parents in a second, because there was no way he would let them get away with doing something so rotten. But as he was as weak as a butterfly, he decided to yell instead, he had great lung capacity.

“Are you fucking dumb?” He yelled as he stood up, chair practically flying backwards. “Donald, you just committed child abuse at the hand of your own son. Here I sat and thought you loved him, you fucking care about him ten times more than me, and you just slap him because he expresses his opinion - which is a fucking true statement - about Mutants. You guys are fucking scum, not Mutants. I do anything in my power to protect my brother, and I am willing to fucking kill you if you threaten him.”

“Are you threatening us?” Donna asked, her voice low like a grunt.

“Yeah, because I am fucking done with you guys,” Gerard was close to crying and breaking down right in front of them, but he stood tall. “I don’t want you to spit any shit on me or Mikey. I will no longer tolerate any of your rudeness, I’ve stood out with it for years,” voice crack “and I can no longer take it. You two are assholes, a typical and cliché family that hate their children and fucking abuse them. You are disgusting, and you are the main reason why humans disgust me. I fucking hate you, I truly do.”

The two adults sat in silence as they looked at their son, dumbfounded. Gerard didn’t spare them a single thought though, as he left the table to go after Mikey. As he made his way up the stairs, he felt a tear slip down his cheek. He’s never dared to express his hatred for his parents, and he suddenly felt relief wash over him as he finally got to say what had been bugging him for years. He needed that so badly, and it felt as if someone had lifted weights off his shoulders.

“Mikey, you in there?” Gerard asked softly as he knocked on the door to his brother's bedroom.

Some shuffling was heard from inside, and the lock was turned on the door. Gerard opened it up softly, and walked into his brother’s messy room. Not that Gerard had anything to say, his room was even messier.

Mikey crawled into his bed, settling down in the corner. His eyes were red, and it was obvious that he had been crying. The whole scene of it made Gerard’s heart break, and he just felt like running up to his baby brother and protect him from all the bad things in the world.

Gerard closed the door after him, and locked it, just to make sure their parents wouldn’t barge in and yell at them. He crawled into the bed after his brother, and laid an arm around him. Mikey had his legs pressed up to his chest, and face buried in his knees. It was an obvious way of trying to hide the fact that he was crying, Gerard had seen it before. It wasn’t often that either brother cried, but when they did they made sure to comfort their respective brother.

“You know that they’re just being them,” Gerard whispered softly, running one of his hands through Mikey’s blond mess of a hair. “They’ll eventually forget it.”

“Yeah and if they forget it they won’t fucking remember slapping me,” Mikey’s wet voice was honestly heartbreaking to Gerard, he was supposed to protect his baby brother but had failed miserably. “They’ve never hit me before, only yelled. I don’t get why dad suddenly had to slap me,” Mikey looked up to see his brother dead in the eye. “It hurt, Gee. It hurt.”

Only those simple words weight down on Gerard as if the whole world had been placed upon him. As if he just got a mission from the New World Order that he was supposed to disarm a bomb that could detonate at anytime and kill everyone on the entire planet. Mikey was his whole world, and seeing his brother in pain hurt him more than actually getting the impact himself.

“I know, and I’ll from now on protect you from everything and anything,” Gerard promised, taking Mikey’s hands in his own. “I’ll do anything in my power as not to let anyone harm you. I’ll commit my own life to protecting you. Because I fucking love you so much, and it breaks me to see you hurt.” Tears started rolling down his cheeks, and a sob slipped past Mikey’s lips.

“Kids, come out of the room,” their father’s harsh voice scared Gerard, but he tried to stay as calm as possible. “Fucking open the door. We’re just gonna teach you a lesson.” Donald banged on the door, making the brothers flinch simultaneously.

“Okay, you know what, we’re either gonna fucking die here or we’re gonna die taking a fucking risk,” Gerard mumbled to his brother, who seemed to think over it for a few seconds until he nodded. “I have no idea if it will effectively work or whatever, but we will for sure have a safe landing, if it succeeds. We’ll use my time portals to get down there. I tried it today and-”

“Open the fucking door!” Gerard bit his bottom lip, almost to the brim where it felt like he would punctuate it. He quickly stood up in front of the only window in Mikey’s room, opening a time portal to the right side of him and trying his best at creating one outside.

“Gee, they’re gonna beat the door down…” Mikey whispered as he stood up from the bed, standing closer to his brother. “I’m scared.”

At those words, something seemed to snap in Gerard’s mind, and to his surprise a dark, almost glitching hole was created on the outside. It didn’t look safe for a cent, but it was better than nothing. Okay, I am not sure if it’s safe but to hell with it. You go first, I need to concentrate on keeping it open.” Mikey gave his brother a worried look, even if he couldn’t see it. But he did as he was told, slowly and surely did he put his arm through the portal.

Gerard watched as his brother got out safely on the other side of the portal, and he smiled slightly as he saw Mikey’s confused but relieved face expression. That’s also when Gerard decided to be an idiot, and threw himself into the portal next to him, clumsily landing on the grass on the outside.

“Ah, fuck that hurt,” he grumbled as he shut the two portals successfully. The redhead sat up and rubbed his back, yeah, remind him to never throw himself into a portal again.

“What are we gonna do now though?” His brother’s worried voice came from the left, and Gerard whipped his head to catch Mikey nervously pulling at his hoodie’s sleeves. Gerard being Gerard actually had no idea, and he felt stumped over the fact that he hadn’t thought the whole plan through. He wasn’t really the smartest guy in the world.

“We’ll go over to Ray’s, I believe he said his brothers wouldn’t be home this week,” the teen got up from the grass and brushed off the dirt from his skinny jeans. “Come on.”

Luckily, Ray’s house wasn’t too far away from their own, so it only took a couple of minutes and they were standing at the doorstep. Gerard knocked on the door, and a few seconds later Ray appeared.

“Oh, what are you- have you been crying?” He immediately went into parent mode, and took the two brothers in. He sat them down in the living-room, and both of Ray’s parents prepared some food for them, as they hadn’t really gotten anything to eat. Mikey’s cheek was still red Gerard noticed, and he was offered an ice pack, but politely said that it didn’t hurt. Bullshit, Gerard pointed out but let it slide.

“So, what happened to you two?” Ray asked as he sat down on the coffee table in front of the two brothers, who sat in the way too cozy couch. Ray may have lived in a small house, but unlike in the Way’s house their actually felt like a family actually lived there. It had that sort of aura to it.

“Well, Mikey bitched back at mom and dad for looking down at Mutants and saying that they were disgusting,” Gerard inhaled a shaky breath, and he took one of his brother's hands in his own which were surprisingly cold. “They slapped him for it, and I got like super mad at them because of that. Dad got angry at me and like wanted to fucking kill us or some shit, I don’t know man.” He ran a hand through his messy hair, then letting it fall back in his eyes.

“Does that happen a lot?” a female voice came from beside them, and Mrs. Toro was suddenly standing there with two plates of food. Ray moved from the table for her to be able to put it down in front of the two brothers, and both of them quickly dug in.

“No, they usually just yell a lot at me, but not at Mikey,” Gerard confessed, mouth full with food. “They never take it to physical lengths though, until now that is…” Mrs. Toro watched the two boys in silence, her face expression filled with sympathy. She nodded and then walked out of the room, closing the door connecting the living-room to the kitchen.

“They’re not gonna take mom and dad away from us, right?” Mikey’s small voice spoke up, and Gerard shook his head at his brother. Mikey smiled at that, and he buried himself in his hoodie. It was honestly adorable to Gerard, because even if Mikey was tall he was trying to seem small. He was very skinny though, so his height didn’t really matter to anyone. But it wasn’t like he was some kind of street fighter. What if he was though? What if Mikey was some sort of MMA fighter and Gerard was just too blind to see it?

He was truly starting to scare himself with his thoughts.

“Do you guys want something? Or do you want to talk about what happened?” Ray asked kindly and made eye contact with Gerard. He only shook his head, but reached out for the TV remote to turn it on. Ray’s family had way more channels than Gerard’s, so he liked to take the opportunity and watch some crappy TV.

They sat there for about thirty minutes, watching some crime channel in silence. It was nice, but Gerard just couldn’t seem to get the thought of his parents out of his head. What the fuck were they supposed to do when they couldn't come back to the house? Were they even allowed to go inside? He did have his key on him - it was in his phone case - but what would they do once they realized their sons were back? They couldn’t kick either boy out of the house, but next year for all he knew Gerard could be living on the street. They had full permission from the law to kick him out when he turned eighteen.

Gerard was honestly scared for his life, he could die by the hands of his parents. Or even worse, his brother could die at the hands of their parents. If it ever got too violent, Gerard would make sure to finally reveal that he had powers. They would probably kick him out anyways, it wasn’t like they cared for him, they never had. Gerard’s earliest memory was of him sitting and drawing in his loneliness, they would always care for Mikey the most. He was their little golden child, Gerard was the failed one.

“Would you two like to stay the night here? You seem pretty scarred by the incident,” Mrs. Toro was back in room again, now with a slightly calmer face expression. The two brothers seemed to have some telepathic speaking between them, because after a few seconds of staring at each other they both nodded. “Well you can borrow some clothes from Ray, maybe it’ll be a little too big as both of you are shorter than Ray.”

“It’s okay, we appreciate your care enough, we could probably go around in today’s clothes anyways,” Gerard almost insisted, but Mrs. Toro shook her head.

“You have dirt marks on the back of your shirt, Gerard,” she stated, and he smiled goofily. He had not noticed that whatsoever. Well most likely because he couldn’t see the back of his shirt, he didn’t have any 360° vision. Would be cool though, he realized.

“You boys can stay up a little longer, us adults are just gonna go and talk about a little something,” she said, and Gerard could feel Ray’s cringe from two seats away. Mrs. Toro was a nice woman, even if her wording could be quite unique at times.

She left the room, and the three boys were left behind to watch some TV. They watched one of Gerard and Ray’s shared favorite cartoons, Ed, Edd n Eddy. Mikey seemed to enjoy it too, and he seemed to have declared Ed as his favorite character just after the first episode. It made Gerard happy, even if his favorite character was Kevin.

“Guys, I think we should go to bed,” Ray suddenly stated, and both of the Way brothers looked at the clock hanging on a wall. It was only about ten o’clock, but Gerard knew the Toro family went to bed at a reasonable time, unlike himself.

Ray turned off the TV, and both of the brothers huffed in annoyance as the TV screen went black. He promptly told them to get their lazy butts off the couch, and both of them groaned as they slowly made their way up from the couch. They knew that Ray meant well but god, neither was tired enough to go to bed. It was only the time for a sixth grader to go to bed, maybe not even that.

“You have any clothes we can borrow?” Gerard asked as they got into Ray’s room. Ray went over to his closet, and pulled out a shirt for each boy.

“Is it okay if you just sleep in a shirt?” He asked, and Gerard rolled his eyes.

“Ray, we can sleep in our own shirts, no need to borrow anything.”

“Gerard, I feel like it’s important for you not to walk around and or sleep in dirty clothes, you’ve been wearing it all day,” Ray stated as he turned around to give the brothers a worried face. “I care about you two, and it may just be your temporary nightwear. Who knows how long you’ll be staying here…” he whispered the last part, but it didn’t go past the brothers. Both of them looked down at the floor, and Gerard felt a sting in his heart.

“Uh, well thanks, Ray,” Mikey mumbled and took one of the shirts. “We appreciate your care, I’ll just loan your bathroom a little. To change… and all…” he lingered around in the room for a little longer than needed, until he exited and went into the bathroom across Ray’s bedroom.

Gerard sighed and lied down on Ray’s bed, a low groan leaving his throat. “I fucking hate it when it’s like this. Mikey turns into this insecure little boy and I turn into this self loathing, awful big brother. But it was like really fucking bad this time, I- I was sure dad was gonna kill us. I was fucking scared, man. I…” he gave up and just let his words fall out into the air, vanishing with time.

“We’ll support you no matter what,” Ray said and sat down next to Gerard, throwing the shirt at him. “Mom and dad almost take care of you as if you were their own kids, and they accept Mutants as well. If things get too rough, I’m sure they would even adopt you, or at least legally get you to stay. If there’s anything you ever need, please, don’t be scared to say anything.”

Gerard nodded at that, and then shooed Ray out of the room as he was about to change. It wasn’t like he was embarrassed of his body, no he could proudly show it off and change in front of his friends without any problem, but when he was having problems at home he was weaker than ever. He hated that feeling, but it was something he just couldn’t stop. It disappointed him, and no matter how many times someone would tell him he was strong during those times, he was too blind to see it.

The teen quickly dressed into the nightwear, and he grumbled quietly to himself as he noticed it was a picture of Backstreet Boys on it. Who the fuck had a shirt with Backstreet Boys on it around Ray’s age? He decided not to question it however, and exited the room. He saw that it was light in one of Ray’s brothers room, and so he decided to peek inside.

Mikey was puffing up the bed, and he didn’t seem to notice Gerard standing in the doorway until he accidentally looked up. It seemed to scare him slightly, as the younger Way jumped back in fright. It only made Gerard smile, and he made his way into the room.

“I see you're actually getting ready,” Gerard said with humor laced in his voice as he walked to his brother. “I thought you were having the same plans as me, not going to bed.”

Mikey - fake - smiled at him, and shook his head. “I was planning the same, but I realized I was kinda tired. I should really sleep, haven’t gotten any good night’s sleep in forever. At least I know I’m safe here.”

“Hop into bed, kid, I’ll tuck you in like we did when we were younger,” Gerard said and grinned at Mikey, who genuinely smiled back at him. The younger Way hopped into bed, burying himself in the cozy covers. Gerard sat down on the edge of the bed and started to tuck his brother in. It was something Gerard used to do about five years ago, and then both of them got “too old” to do anything like that. They both knew that, no, they would never be able to grow out of anything when it came to doing things together but some things just didn’t have the same effect once you get older.

“Do you think mom and dad will forgive me?” Mikey asked tiredly, and Gerard sighed heavily.

“No, they just think that you’ll learn yourself eventually,” he answered and started to run his fingers through Mikey’s hair. “I honestly think they are the ones who should apologize to you, but of course Donna and Donald won’t say sorry. They never say sorry for anything they do wrong, because in their stupid minds they’re never fucking wrong. Don’t beg for their forgiveness, if you submit to them they'll take too much control over you. I know how it is.”

“I’m sorry…” Mikey mumbled, barely audible for Gerard. “I know I’m always in the center of our parents, and when I’m not it’s someone other than you. If you ever are in the center it’s because mom and dad are yelling at you for something “stupid” you did. It’s ridiculous, I know, and I really want us to be a happy family… but why is it that we’re never happy? I don’t get it, what made them hate Mutants so much? I have no memory of them hating them until I started Junior High.”

Gerard was silent. He didn’t really know the answer himself. One day it just seemed as if they hated Mutants more than anything else, and they disowned Gerard all of a sudden. He had ruled out the fact that they knew he was a Mutant, as he was sure they would have done something about it if so. Maybe they did know that he was one, but they just didn’t say anything about it because they were too ashamed. He didn’t see why they wouldn’t tell him that they knew, if so. They could easily kick him out, spit on his grave and crush him with a bulldozer. It was obvious they weren’t the perfect parents, far from it, but Gerard never understood why they hated him so much.

“I don’t know, Mikey. I don't know.”

Gerard ran his hand through Mikey’s hair until the younger one fell asleep, much to Gerard’s surprise. He could probably never fall asleep if someone was running their goddamn hand through his hair, it was one hell of a distraction. Then yet again, Mikey was tired and most of the time when Gerard went to sleep it was because he forced himself to, not because he was tired.

“He’s asleep?” A voice came from the door, and Gerard looked to to see Ray standing in the doorway. He nodded and looked down at his sleeping brother.

“He fell asleep not too long ago.”

“He must have been worn out from all of the drama today, you know when you get emotionally tired. He doesn't cry a lot…”

“I know, he’s not like me, who cries easily over sad movies,” the two friends laughed silently, and a comfortable silence spread out over them. It felt nice, like if it was right for them to just - creepily - stare at Mikey as he slept. Even Gerard had to say it was a tiny bit creepy that Ray was still standing in the doorway, until he realized that maybe he wanted to check up on the brothers. They had been through more than enough for one day.

“He’s nice, your brother,” Ray suddenly stated and Gerard looked up at him with a slightly confused expression on his face. “You’re not alike each other that much when it comes to appearance, but you’re more alike in personality. He’s not as extreme as you can be at times, and not that much of an ass,” rude, Gerard pointed out. “But he’s nice, nonetheless. You too, Gerard.”

The redhead sneered at that, but with no bad intent. “The younger ones are usually the more loved ones, y’know.” At that, Gerard got up from the bed. They two friends left the room, but before Gerard closed the door, he whispered a soft goodnight to his brother.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“Gerard, you have to get up, there’s breakfast downstairs,” Ray’s voice said on the other side of the bedroom door, and Gerard mumbled some incoherent words about how he would go up. He heard how Ray left, and Gerard pulled his upper body up.

He’d been allowed to sleep in one of Ray’s brothers’ room, and even if it was nice of them to let him sleep there, it still felt slightly weird to Gerard. He’s been friends with Ray ever since they were young, and his brothers were very nice to Gerard as well, but it still felt weird. Probably because Ray’s family were closer than Gerard’s own, and it felt like he forced himself into it.

The teen exited the bedroom and went down the stairs. He heard voices coming from the kitchen, and saw the Toro family as well as his brother sitting by the kitchen table. Or well, Mikey sat on one of the counters, a bad habit he had obtained as their own table used to be quite dirty. No one wanted to sit there, but everyone in the Way family were too lazy to clean it, so the brothers usually sat on the counters. Mikey especially.

“Good morning, Gerard,” Mr. Toro greeted him, and Gerard smiled back as an answer. “Did you sleep well?”

“Good enough, considering yesterday's events I could have slept worse,” he answered honestly, and sat down on the empty chair next to Ray. He glared over at Mikey, because even if they both were kinda close to the Toro’s, you didn’t just sit on a counter when there was a chair to sit on. There are those things called morals in the world for a reason.

“So, I contacted your parents this morning,” Mrs. Toro said, and both of the brothers instantly had their attention directed at her. “They’re still angry at you, and I would suggest that you two stay here for a day or two more. I just want to know what happened, if that’s okay by you boys?”

Gerard bit his bottom lip, looking down at the bowl in front of him. The Toro family did accept him, they wouldn’t do anything to hurt him. They knew about his powers, they were accepting of who he was in any form and way. They wouldn’t hurt him for showing his true self, they wouldn't dare to.

“We were fighting over Mutant things… Donald slapped Mikey and I got mad. I treated it the wrong way, I know, it was stupid of me but like I was angry? I just felt like fucking murdering them right there and then, they hurt my brother. You know how much that hurt?” Gerard’s voice could barely hold itself up, and Ray’s parents both gave him a sympathized look. “It was painful, because honestly, I thought they would never hurt Mikey. He was safe from their abuse.”

“Would you like us to report this to the police?” Mrs. Toro asked. “What they are doing to you two are highly illegal, and not acceptable in any way, boys.”

“No, I don’t,” Gerard said and clenched his fists. “It doesn’t happen often, or at least not the physical abuse, the first time actually. I’m used to all the jabs they throw at me, but that’s because I behave badly a lot. I can be quite the rebel teen,” lie. “If either of us ever come across any trouble, will you be there for us though?”

“Of course,” Mr. Toro said and reached over the table to take one of Gerard’s hands in his. “You’re both welcome over here at any given time, we’ll be sure to give you food and shelter. If you ever need us we’ll be sure to be there for you.”

Gerard smiled warmly at that, and he nodded. He was finally accepted somewhere, somewhere where he felt like home.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“I want you to concentrate on your body energy, hard.”

Gerard listened to Martha’s words as she paced around the art classroom, trying his hardest to find… his body energy? Whatever that was supposed to be. He couldn’t find it however, because what the fuck was he supposed to search for anyways? Was he supposed to be relaxed? Was he supposed to tense his whole body? He truly didn’t understand.

“If you focus on the inside of you, you’ll maybe feel something either warm or cold, depending on you as an individual.”

“How do we know if it’s supposed to be warm or cold?” Brendon asked, and he looked up at the old woman with an irritated look on his face.

“You’ll feel it, I promise.”

The teens sat in silence as all of them tried their hardest at finding their so called body energy. Apparently, every single Mutant had something called that, and it was unique from Mutant to Mutant. It would either be cold or warm, different from person to person. No one knew why it was warm or cold, but from what scientists had researched no one could apparently fall in love with someone who had the same temperature as themselves. It was basically a restriction for soulmates. Gerard truly thought it was dumb that they knew that of all things, but barely anything else. Those researchers or whatever really sucked.

“Fuck!” A voice suddenly yelled, and Gerard quickly looked up to see Pete’s right hand burning. He looked panicked, as he waved his arm around in hysteria. Frank - who sat next to him - looked more at ease, but he wasn’t necessarily calm either.

“Peter, calm down,” Martha said sternly, and the teen gave her what you could describe as the look of a psychopath. “Your own fire won’t burn your skin, it may burn your clothes however. But if you keep the flames under control it won’t expand, so keep calm because panic can cause fire to rapidly expand.” He rolled up his college jacket’s sleeve, and Frank was trying his best at calming him down. It went with mixed results, as Frank started to panic himself instead as if he inhaled his friend’s panic like Kirby or something.

“Okay okay okay, holy shit,” Pete whispered as he stopped waving his arm around and instead, focused his gaze at the now much calmer flames. “I can’t stop it. What the fuck, what am I supposed to do. I have this burning feeling inside of me, is this my body energy? Or am I just burning on the inside because that wouldn’t fucking surprise me.”

“I believe that's your body energy, Peter,” Martha said calmly, as if the boy catching on fire was something completely normal and totally nothing you should worry about. “Great job, I'm impressed that you managed to find it so quick. At least with your current knowledge of it.” Her gaze lingered on Pete a little longer than necessary, and Gerard started to understand why Mikey was creeped out by her.

“What the hell am I supposed to do?” Pete almost complained, panic still clear in his voice.

“You’ll have to channel your inner power, so to say, and concentrate on your fire. If you can create fire you can also expand and decrease it, although it may be a bit harder doing so. As long as you keep calm, you’ll hopefully not expand it any further. Concentrating is the key to control.”

Gerard listened to Martha’s words, and put his concentration on his own powers. He suddenly felt a sting in the lower back which made its way all the way up to his neck. It hurt, and he almost felt it crawl up his spine in some creepy manner. That’s also when he felt a burning sensation in the pit of his stomach, and he swore loudly as he opened up his eyes.

Much to his surprise, no one reacted. They were all still, and clearly way more concentrated than what he was. He looked over to where Frank and Pete were sitting, and to his surprise even they were still, and so was Pete’s fire. It was as if he had stopped time itself.

“Holy fuck,” Gerard mumbled at the realization. “I’ve stopped time. Oh my god, what the fuck. Mikey, can you hear me?” He spoke to his brother who sat to the left of him, but Mikey didn’t bat an eye at his words. “Okay, concentrate, concentrate.” Gerard clenched his fists as he closed his eyes. No fucking way that he was going to stay somewhere where time had stopped. Did he stop time just in the room or time in general? If he stopped time all over the world, wouldn’t that suddenly make him the most powerful Mutant? Although, he was starting to feel drained for some reason, as if someone had sucked out his energy out of him.

“Patrick, I see you’re making progress, well as long as I actually can see.” Gerard heard Martha say, and he opened up his eyes in an instant. Everyone around him were suddenly moving, or at least in the slightest. Pete was no longer burning, and Martha was pacing around in the room, just like she had done before.

“I think I literally just stopped time,” everyone turned to look at Gerard, and Martha had a shocked look on her face as she turned to the teen. “I have no idea what happened, but I felt this pain going through my spine and this burning hot feeling inside of me and so I opened my eyes and everyone and everything was still. It was fucking dead, or something.”

“I see you too have found your body energy, also a quick learner,” Martha gave him the same look as she had given Pete before, and now Gerard truly realized Mikey’s fear for her. It was creepy as fucking hell.

“How come some of us are a lot quicker than others?” Tyler asked, a scowl on his face. “Like, I’ve also had this feeling inside of me but it was ice cold, and I suddenly lifted from the ground and then fell down like a stone and felt heavier than ever. That’s never happened to me before. I suppose that I found my body energy - this happened to me a few days ago - and I somehow used my power at the same time. I did some research on it, and it seems as if when someone finds out if their body energy is warm or cold they also use their power. The reason behind it is unknown though.”

“You’re right, Tyler,” Martha confirmed, and he nodded slowly as if he wanted her to continue. “I see you’ve done your research on it. How did you activate your body energy? Did it just randomly happen or…?”

“Oh, no no,” Tyler said and smiled sheepishly, almost as if he was ashamed of something. “I did my research on this, I’ve been working with it for a few months, when I finally realized that I possessed gravity manipulation or gravity control, whatever you may wanna call it. As my power apparently is a very rare one, there’s limited information about it, but I dug up everything I could find.”

“How come I couldn't find anything when I was researching about my own powers?” Gerard interrupted, and Tyler turned to him.

“I’ve done some real deep digging into this, even making my way into the deep web, which is where I found all of the information. I was even ready to make my way into the dark web to find anything, but thankfully I didn’t have to. There was this page about Mutants and all, and I found it to be very helpful.” Gerard was to remember that.

“That’s great, Tyler. Do you think the two of us could speak to each other after this?” Martha asked, and the teen nodded wearily. Josh immediately whispered something to his best friend, and the two started a full blown conversation, but a very hushed one. Their friendship could easily be compared with Gerard and Mikey’s own friendship.

The teens continued on trying to find their body energy, and the other cool afro dude who apparently was named Joe found his, and he had a sudden urge to run. Gerard remembered he had super speed, which was fucking amazing in his opinion. Who wouldn’t wanna be The Flash or Quicksilver, two of comics’ greatest speedsters? Patrick found his as well, and so did Frank’s friend, Bob. He accidentally smashed the table he was sitting at, and Gerard was a little too close at bursting out in laughter.

They were allowed to go after an hour or so, and Gerard was pretty happy with his results. Someone who he noticed wasn’t happy with his results was his brother, who had a constipated look on his face. Sure, he never really looked happy and looked outright bored about eighty percent of the time, but Gerard knew his brother too well to know he was ticked off about not finding his body energy.

“It’ll eventually come to you too,” Gerard said and slung an arm over Mikey’s shoulders as they walked in the direction of Ray’s car. “The majority of us didn’t even find their body energy, so I guess you’ll get to it. You’re younger and don’t have as much as experience as your big ol’ brother here, so it’s probably understandable.”

“I didn't succeed either, although I hope it comes to me sooner I later,” Ray said and smiled at the two brothers, who smiled back at him. Well Gerard smiled at least. “Come on, let’s go home and make some pancakes to celebrate this!”

Gerard cheered loudly at that, his thoughts immediately focused on the delicious food. But he couldn’t help but to feel some kind of weird feeling in him, as if he had forgotten something or done something he shouldn’t have. It annoyed him slightly, but he brushed it off as feeling uneasy after using too much of his powers.

There was no need to worry for something that wouldn’t affect him directly afterwards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tHERE ARE SO MANY INCORRECT THINGS HERE. I truly have no idea what the names of Ray's family members are, so I'll just stick to Mr and Mrs Toro. This chapter sucked n all but there ya had it longest chapter yet


	5. "I'm A Mess" And "Cry Me A River" Are Two Songs Mashed Together To Resemblance This Chapter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> yet another mess of messes that I create in my mess plot of a messy story

When Gerard, Mikey and Ray arrived at the school the next day, Patrick was waiting for them outside. Gerard was surprised to see him, because as far as he knew he had spoken to Mikey like once. Maybe that meant that they were friends according to Patrick, but Gerard was a little harder to trick. The boy was nice, sure, but for all he knew he could backstab them all of a sudden. It was always the nice ones.

“Hello,” Patrick said cheerily as they got over to him.

“Hey,” Mikey answered, not with much happiness in his voice, at least not compared to Patrick. “What are you doing out here?” His question probably came out a bit ruder than he intended, and it was noticeable that Patrick was a bit taken aback.

“Uh, I just wanted to meet you up and all,” he mumbled and ran a hand through his not-so-emo fringe. “I thought it would be nice if we walked to our lesson together. We share biology class…” the fact that Patrick knew Mikey’s classes creeped Gerard out, but he realized that maybe his brother had shared his scheme or something. It wouldn’t surprise him, Patrick was the only - known - sophomore with Mutant powers other than his brother.

“Oh right, yeah, I forgot,” Mikey slurred out, almost as if he was a bit tipsy. “Come on. See you later, Gee.” The two sophomores walked into the school, and Gerard and Ray were left behind. The redhead was a bit confused. No, not just a bit confused, he was really confused. The whole ordeal between the two boys had gone by quickly, with one of them being drunk and the other fidgety. Okay, Mikey wasn’t drunk but he was obviously tired, very tired.

Gerard decided to ignore that however, and he and Ray walked into the school as well. They were a bit surprised as not to see Brendon standing by their lockers as he usually did, but maybe he had just woken up late, it was something that happened the teen a lot. It was probably because he was awake all night as not to miss anything happening on his phone, Gerard thought. Even if it didn’t make any sense, really.

The school day was like any other day. Brendon did arrive later, and Gerard started to think his theory may actually be accurate. He passed by Frank on his way to one of his lessons, and the boy actually said hi to him. It startled the older one slightly, and he almost tripped over his own feet which in turn made him drop his pencil case and phone, which landed with a crack on the floor.

“Aw shit, man,” Frank said nervously and reached out for the phone, turning it around so he could see the screen, eyes turning wide as he saw the result. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. I- I apologize, the screen is cracked here in the right corner and holy shit I am so so sorry. That was not meant to happen, I’ll even pay for the bill if you want it repaired, I’m so sorry I-”

“Frank,” Gerard giggled and took his phone from the teen. “It was like that from the beginning, no need to panic. Thanks for the care though, appreciate it.” He smiled at Frank, who smiled back, and maybe Gerard melted just a little bit inside, just maybe. “Well I see ya later, I guess.” They waved at each other and Gerard continued to his class, a smile on his face. Gosh, he was such a fangirl, self certified Frank Iero trash.

Gerard’s school day didn’t really bring any more excitement than that, which he found boring. He listened to music the whole day as he didn’t share any lessons with any of his friends after lunch on Thursdays. He noticed he shared a class with Bob, and Tyler gave him his number as well as the name of the website about the Mutants. He was going to get more details later, but apparently the junior was late to class so he had to leave urgently.

The door was open to the art classroom as Gerard arrived there after school had ended, and he realized that someone else must be there before him, not too much of a surprise. About two thirds of the people who were supposed to be there were sitting by random desks, and he saw his brother sitting next to Ray.

“Ah, Gerard,” Martha said as he made his way over to his brother and friend. He stopped in his tracks and looked at the woman with confusion laced on his face. “I want you to join the other boys in the little room.” She pointed over to what you could call a group room, that was mostly filled with different art supplies. Through the window Gerard could see that Tyler, Joe, Bob and Patrick were already in there, and Tyler waved enthusiastically as the two made eye contact. Martha told him to go inside, and Gerard did as he was told.

“Hey, dude,” Tyler chirped up as Gerard closed the door behind him. “Sorry for just running away earlier, I had to go to class and all but you have to download the Tor browser to access the deep web. Then you’ll be able to access things without your IP-address showing, which is great and all. But it’s probably better if I text this to you, the link and all. Although don’t press it, because it won’t even be a link,” he laughed dryly at that, and an awkward silence spread out over teens. Gerard reminded himself to sit down, so he sat next to Tyler and his fancy hipster-Hawaiian shirt. The redhead didn’t understand fashion at some points, because when was it cool to dress like Elvis on his Blue Hawaii album?

Hipsters were weird, Gerard concluded.

Pete barged in only a few seconds later however, and it scared the living hell of both Gerard and Patrick. “Sorry, I was like a lil’ bit busy and all. Frank dropped his phone in one of the school’s toilets but it’s still alive, thankfully,” everyone were silent. To no one’s surprise, it wasn’t really something that anyone should reply to. What would they say anyways? Oh that’s great, or what? It’s Pete Wentz, for god’s sake.

“Does anyone know what we’re supposed to do here or…” Joe broke the awkward silence, giving Pete the time to sit down next to Bob, who gave his friend an angry look. Gerard realized that they were like The Thing and Human Torch, and it made him smile, but only faintly because if someone saw him smile out of nowhere they would ask him why. It’s not like his love for comic books was something to hide, but the fact that he inspected the two friends so closely was a tiny bit creepy to him. Okay, Gerard thought a lot was creepy when it came to people so that wasn’t really a surprise.

“Well when me and Mikey arrived here Martha told me to go here,” Patrick said, and Gerard turned to look out the window at the mention of his brother’s name. Mikey was lying on his desk, hood pulled over his head, most likely sleeping. The two brothers had been up all night, as neither of them could sleep. But around 3 am Gerard had decided to go back to “his” room, and fallen asleep shortly thereafter. Mikey had sent a text to him at around 5 am, telling him he couldn’t sleep, but as Gerard wasn’t awake around that time there was nothing he could do about it. He knew that Mikey probably was awake all night, because it was something that happened to both brothers at uneven times. Bad thing was when one had a bad night the other usually had a good one. There had to be balance in the Way brothers’ life.

“She told me that I was to tell you what to do when all of you had arrived, and so you have,” Patrick explained, pushing his glasses further up on his nose. “What we have in common is the fact that we all have found our body energy, which is why she put us here. Instead of trying to find our body energy, she wants us to try and expand our powers.”

“Oh, right!” Tyler suddenly exclaimed, and Patrick jumped slightly at the sudden outburst. Gerard cringed a little, because, he just shouted that right in his ear. “Body energy is just like a lock on the powers a Mutant has. If you wanted to know… just… yeah.” Awkwardness formed in the room once again, and Gerard guessed that everyone realized that they would never be able to escape the awkwardness. God he really hated it.

“Well anyone who’s supposed to begin and show us their power or whatever?” Pete asked and eyed everyone in the room. “We can’t use our powers at the same time because it’ll be so fucking messy and all. You get what I mean?”

“Well then go ahead, Arnstein,” Bob teased his short friend, and Gerard really wanted to correct him over the fact he pronounced the name of one of the most famous physicists of all time wrong, but decided to keep quiet. Who knew, maybe Bob would turn into the Hulk. But then again, Hulk was only strong when he actually was Hulk and not Bruce Banner, and Bob was strong all the time. Yeah, Gerard was going to make sure not to land on Bob’s bad side. He should probably think the same about Pete, as the younger one probably could set his house on fire. Pete seemed to be interested in Mikey though - disgusting, Gerard concluded - so maybe he was going to spare him. Maybe.

“It’s on, bitch,” Pete growled as he glared at his supposed friend, who only grinned back at him. Pete stood up from his chair, relaxed his shoulders and cracked his knuckles as he stared intently at the wall in front of him. Now, that would have been kinda badass if it wasn’t for the fact that the teen just stood there, doing nothing what-so-fucking-ever. It was as if he was in some sort of anime and he just had to have a flashback for three episodes before his powers could activate. It was always so ridiculous, that most of the times Gerard would instead think about what their enemy could do during the time they had a flashback.

“Okay Pete, but I don’t think you have the best control over your powers,” Joe stated, and the teen frowned at him with a small pout on his lips. “Maybe someone who seems to know more about their power could like guide you? Patrick and Tyler seem to have quite the good guess about their respective powers, and so I think one of them should be the one to start. It would make sense, wouldn’t it?” 

Even if he didn’t seem to agree with Joe’s suggestion, Pete went along with it anyways. It’s not like he could control his powers anyways, he would just randomly lit himself or something on fire, and that wasn't really the most effective super power.

“I’ll go first,” Tyler took the initiative as he pushed his chair out from the table. Silence covered the room like a blanket yet again, and Gerard was starting to get very annoyed by the repetitive pattern of awkward silences. This one wasn’t too long however, as Tyler slowly but surely started to fucking levitate. He just lifted off the chair like a little balloon, and Gerard was actually quite impressed by it.

The teen hit the roof not too long after, and he smiled down at the others as he suddenly “fell” to the ceiling - and Gerard realized how weird it sounded. “This is always a little creepy,” Tyler said as he looked down at his teammates/friends/acquaintances, they didn't have an official name for each other. “I’ve tried this a few times before, but actually looking down on you? That’s on a whole other level.” His face was filled with amazement, and he looked genuinely happy. It was cute, even Gerard had to admit that.

“I wish I could do that,” Patrick said, dumbfounded.

“Well I wish I could turn invisible, or bend time,” Tyler said as he slowly started to float down to the floor again. “I mean wouldn’t that be kind of cool? Actually, almost every superpower is cool in its own way.”

“Even the power to turn into ice-cream?” Gerard asked and tried to hide a giggle. The other teens looked at him with questionable face expressions. “There's this superhero who can turn into ice-cream, the best and only superhero I need. I wonder if it exists powers like that though. I mean, some powers may be more normal than others, but as stated we're just a few of those powers. There may be millions of powers out there.”

“There’s no estimated number, but there is believed to be thousands of powers out there, possibly even more,” Tyler said, as if telling some bad exposition for a story because there was no smoother way of delivering it. “Yes, we may just be a few of them, but two of us have what is classified as “very rare powers” - me and Gerard. Some others like Frank’s, will get rarer the more the person will gain knowledge and of the power, the same with Mikey. It’s different from power to power, the more knowledge and the stronger you get, the more sub-powers you can learn to your main power.”

“So you mean people get more powerful the more they expand or train their power, or whatever,” Pete asked, and Tyler nodded as he sat down in his chair again. “But can you expand pyro… my power.”

“You must be able to,” Tyler said more to himself than anyone else. “Like you can create fire and such, but maybe you can extend it to a better level? Honestly I never read about pyrokinesis, so I don’t know that much about it.” Pete didn’t seem to be satisfied with the answer, and he huffed loudly and crossed his arms over his chest. Childish, Gerard thought, but then reminded himself that he did so as well, so he wasn’t really more noble than Pete.

The five boys continued on talking about powers, and eventually each showed them off. Gerard created two time portals, and took some art supplies from one of the shelfs to show how to use it, just to show that it was “legit” - in Pete’s words. Patrick easily shifted from invisible to visible, and he seemed to have the best control over his powers. Bob lifted the table they were sitting at, and Joe ran in and out of the room faster than what the boys could see. Gerard was truly amazed by them.

A knock on the door broke their conversation - which was going surprisingly well - and the boys turned to the door. Ryan peeked in and looked behind him once, before turning back to the teens. “I was just going to say that you should probably get outta here. I had this vision, and it involved this room. Not sure if it was today, but all I saw was it being all trashed. It was only for a quick second, but Martha said that I should take you out here instead.” The five boys looked at each other, but slowly rose from their seats and followed Ryan out of the room.

Gerard didn’t really know what to think about the guy. He had triggered - or something - the boy with the drawings he had drawn on the table, and he never got to know what it was about. No one seemed to know who Ryan was, apart from Brendon who apparently was in the same choir as him, but it didn’t really expand his knowledge of him any further. He seemed to get random visions, and that wasn’t much to go on really. Gerard would have to ask if anyone knew who he really was, no way that he was gonna go up to the creepy oracle and ask about him. It would also seem very suspicious of Gerard suddenly walking up to him and wanting to be friends, he wasn't really known for being good at social interactions. Rather quite the opposite, actually.

“I wouldn’t want to take any risks,” Martha explained as the boys sat down by their friends, if they had any. Gerard noticed that Ryan and Joe sat next to each other, and wondered if they were friends or just happened to sit next to each other. 

But because his concentration was on something totally else, he painfully missed his own chair that he was supposed to sit on and fell to the ground instead. Brendon - whom he was going to sit next to - laughed his ass off at the scene, which brought the attention of everyone else. Gerard managed to make eye contact with Frank, who was smirking at the scene. It made the redhead blush as red as his own hair, and he quickly got up to sit down on the chair.

God, why couldn’t he just be normal for once?

“God, I hope you’re okay, Gerard,” Martha said and the teen nodded, even if he wasn't. “Good. I recently got a message from the Government to deliver to you, or all Mutants in this town actually, but since you’re young and capable of expanding your powers quickly you are the main target. Our town is currently being threatened by a man named Douglas, the man who is in charge of the bad Mutant Government, The Departed. He is an alleged threat to our town, and so I want all of you to evolve as quickly as possible with your powers. Sure, you are not the only ones who wield powers, but you’re all young, which can prove to be better than older Mutants.”

“How is that?” Frank questioned, and Martha whipped her head over to the boy with a stern look on her face, as if she was ready to kill him for interjecting. “Aren’t the old ones the ones are supposed to know the most about everything and all? They basically have more experience than us. Aren’t they better qualified for this job?”

“Don’t you want to fight against the evil, Frank?” Martha questioned, and Frank’s face twisted into something sick and disgusting, as if he hated just looking at the old woman.

“What purpose does it serve me anyways?

“Do you want the human race to die?”

“It not like they have done anything for us anyways!” Frank shouted angrily and violently stood up, making the scene a little more dramatic than necessary. “Every person I know is a fucking ass - sorry Pete - but I fucking hate everyone. There’s not a single person whom I can truly say that I love from the bottom of my heart, because everyone are absolute shit, you know? I have no friends, and no one who believes in me for being me. It’s fucking awful.

“Why should I help the awful thing called humans anyways, when all they want is for me to fucking die? They don’t serve me in any way, and the only person who I know and likes me who is a human, is my mom. She doesn’t fucking know that I’m a scumbag Mutant. Do you know what happened the day at the break in? No? I fucking read the burglars’ goddamn minds, and do you know what they said? They would kill me without hesitation. Humans are ready to fucking kill others, and you just expect me to fucking help them? Are you really that fucking dense? That you can’t get the fact that humans don’t fucking accept Mutants, they hate us. They fucking hate us, and you- you just want me to help them? They won’t fucking return the goddamn favor, for fucks sake!”

“Frank.” Pete cut in coldly, eyes set on the whiteboard in front of him. “Don’t, please. Just stop.” Frank looked down at his best friend, eyes filled with tears. He looked defeated, as if Pete telling him to stop was the worst thing that could happen to him, and in a way it was. His best and only true friend wasn’t on his side, he wasn’t supported by the one person he thought he could trust, and it broke him. He had no one, no one who would take his hand in theirs and stand next to him. He was alone.

Just like he hated.

Frank looked out over the other students and was met with different face expressions. Fear, anger, concern - negative emotions were directed towards him. No one seemed to be happy for standing up for them. Frank only shook his head in disappointment at them, and he turned around and walked out of the classroom, the door closing slowly behind him.

Martha left after him without saying a word, and the boys were left in an eerie silence. Everyone were watching Pete, or more specifically his back. He was still staring at the whiteboard, face blank. Gerard was a little bit nerved, as Frank’s outburst and short speech actually got to him. He understood what the teen meant, but he didn’t want to walk down a bad path, something that Frank seemed close to be doing.

“Are you okay, Pete?” Gerard heard his brother's voice ask, voice soft and laced with concern, something you didn’t hear a lot. Pete didn’t respond in any sort of way however. It was as if he was frozen in time, but Gerard was glad to see that he was breathing at least. “Pete? We’re worried about you, and all.” It sounded as if Mikey had been friends with him for forever, which they hadn’t. From what Gerard knew they barely knew each other - hopefully.

“I broke him,” Pete responded emptily and turned around in his seat to face the others. “I always take his side of the argument, but seriously? I just couldn't do it. I love Frank and all, but you know? I don’t wanna be evil, I don’t wanna kill people. That’s just awful. And then all I do is just crush Frank with a few, petty words, and I feel like absolute fucking shit over it. I fucking broke him, guys.” He almost seemed desperate, as if he was reaching out to no one in particular, but still in great need of help.

“It’s okay,” Patrick said, which surprised all of them. “We support you, and Frank too.”

“Thanks, but why the hell do I only get support from the sophomores? Are they the only nice ones?” Pete questioned, and the teens laughed slightly. They continued on chit chatting a little, but just briefly. I was still tense because of what Frank had said, because they knew that it was all true. Or at least the whole thing about how humans treated Mutants, not the whole break in thing.

It was about ten minutes later that Martha came back, but with no Frank. She didn’t say anything about it, but instead she told everyone to go, except for Pete. He looked nervous, and Gerard understood why; they were obviously going to talk about Frank and his sudden negative behavior. Sure, Frank could be negative at times, but this was unusual. Even Gerard who barely knew the guy - except for his “small” amount of stalking - thought it was a tad bit weird.

“Oh shit,” Gerard said as he dug around in his bag. He, Ray and Mikey were standing outside the classroom now, and were ready to leave but… “I forgot my chemistry book. I need to go get it, I have a test on Monday. Fuck, uh, you go ahead, I’ll be quick.” The other two nodded and Gerard promptly made his way over to his locker. As he took a sharp turn he noticed Frank, who was sitting by Gerard’s locker. He wondered what he was doing there, and stopped in his tracks. It must have been accidental, it’s not like he wanted to talk to the redhead, right?

“Uh, hey?” He asked the short boy as he made his way over to his locker. Frank’s head whipped up from where it was buried in his hands, and Gerard felt a sting in his heart when he saw the slight red around his eyes. “Oh, Frank… Did it affect you that badly?” Gerard sat down next to him, and took one of Frank’s hands in his own.

“No,” Frank answered half-heartedly, but you could clearly tell that it was a lie. “Or yes. Or I don’t fucking know. I’m just really frustrated. I don’t get how you guys just let her control you like that, it’s obvious that humans don’t like us and yet you just accept the fact that you are forced to help them. Isn’t that fucking stupid? They don’t do anything for us!” He took a deep breath as he noticed how he raised his voice, as a way of trying to calm himself down.

“Well, think of it like this,” Gerard said and looked the younger one dead in the eye. “There are people who serve us in our whole lives. The groceries you buy from the grocery store, we get them thanks to farmers who grow them in masses. We don’t do anything for them, but they still give so much to us. The people who rule over a town or country? We don’t do anything for them, but they try their best at keeping the country under control. Or well we pay taxes but the majority of that money doesn't go directly into their pockets. Firemen? We don’t do anything for them other than starting those awful fires, and yet they’re there to help when needed. We don’t need to do anything for some people to get them to help us-”

“Yeah but those are jobs, Gerard,” Frank interrupted, and Gerard understood why Martha had seemed so pissed over him suddenly butting in with whatever he wanted to say. “They are paid, they get something out of it - money. We don’t get a single cent, not even gratitude. We get hate. That’s it. Hate.”

“How do you know? There’s never been a team of people trying to protect the town. Maybe we could help the police, and then, finally they’ll understand what good we can do. I truly hate some people too, especially my parents. They’re humans as well and my father fucking slapped my brother because he got into this whole “support the Mutants movement” or something. But I still don’t hate humans, because my parents are just an exception. My friend, Ray - one of the the guys with the afros - his parents support Mutants to the end of the world. There are good people out there, Frank. Seriously.”

Frank squirmed slightly, as if not knowing how to feel over what Gerard just had said. “It still won’t excuse the ones who hate Mutants. They’re still assholes.”

“Oh god, I know that,” Gerard sighed. “When I came out to my parents two years ago they were like super supportive of me, but everyone weren’t that supportive of me. My cousin didn’t like it, but I got over it. I’ve realized everyone won’t accept me for who I am, but as long as I can accept myself that's good enough.”

“I didn’t know you were gay,” Frank said, giving Gerard a weirded out look. “But like I- I’m not against LGBT shit and all. Like Pete’s bi-”

“Noticed.”

“Oh. He said that he would fuck your brother.”

“Don’t! Oh my god, Frank, no! You can’t say such things to me,” Gerard yelled and covered his head with his hands, for some reason. “The horror. Ew, ew, ew, no. Stop this madness.” Frank laughed at that, a light little giggle. It was adorable, Gerard had to admit.

“But, thanks I guess,” Frank said after the two had calmed down slightly. “I think I needed that- this talk. I do get your side of it, but also mine and… ugh, just thanks, man. I’ll remember to see it from a different point of view. I still don’t like people though.” Gerard laughed at that, nodding, because he agreed on that.

The two stood up and they said their goodbyes, just something brief. Gerard had honestly wished for a hug or so, but he had spoken to the Frank Iero, so he could be happy for that. And he held his hand, he fucking held Frank’s hand. As he reminded himself of that he almost started to freak out slightly, but then quickly regained his senses and took out his things from his locker. He hastily made his way out of the school, not wanting Ray and Mikey to wait longer than what they already had.

“What took you so long?” Mikey asked him as Gerard sat down in the car.

“Nothing, or well I couldn’t find the goddamn chemistry book,” he lied, and the other two seemed to roll with it, thankfully. He didn’t want to tell them about his talk with Frank, because then they would just question him about it and wanting to know what they said. But Gerard felt like it should stay between the two, Frank seemed like he wanted it to at least, and Gerard was okay with that.

-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

When the three friends arrived back at Ray’s home, they noticed the door was unlocked, which probably indicated that someone was home. Ray called out a “hello” and was met a few seconds later by his mother. She had tears eyes and looked like she was going to break down any second, which made the boys a little worried. Mrs. Toro could usually handle any situation pretty fine, so why was it that she was so affected by something now?

“Mom, are you alright?” Ray asked as he walked over to the woman, who only shook her head in disbelief.

“I am so sorry, Gerard,” Mrs. Toro said and totally ignored her son to go over to the brothers instead. “Your parents called me at work today, and told me they wanted you home. By you, I mean Mikey. They officially said that they didn’t want… that they didn’t want you to come home yet, Gerard.”

Everything stopped. The whole world around Gerard just seemed to freeze, and so did his senses. It almost felt as if someone had told him he had cancer, a death sentence. His whole world just tumbled down in front of him, skyscrapers collapsing and the scenery being covered with dust and ashes. He kind of just deflated, like a balloon. He had no purpose in life, his parents had officially disowned him. He knew they hated him, and he was almost certain they would kick him out one day but, now? It was breaking his heart, much more than he thought. The fact that he would have to leave his brother was even more heart wrenching, and his sadness and hopelessness started to evolve into anger.

“They’re just gonna leave me on the fucking road?” Gerard asked, words barely being able to hold themselves up. “They expect me to just go the fuck away from them? I won’t leave Mikey alone, no fucking way! Tell them to go fuck themselves!”

“Did they give you an explanation of why they chose not to take back Gee?” Mikey asked, and Mrs. Toro turned to the younger Way with blank eyes.

“They thought that maybe Gerard should have a longer time to cool down since your fight, as they saw him as a bigger “threat”. They didn’t say that you were never welcome back, but that they want Mikey back and speak to him. I’m sorry, boys…”

“I understand,” Mikey spoke up after a short lived silence, making the others give him a look of confusion and sympathy. “It’s always just me, isn’t it? There’s nothing I can do about it, it sucks and all but mom and dad can force me back so…” he fell silent and directed his gaze back down to his feet, and Gerard felt an overwhelming feeling of dread wash over him.

Mikey was just going to accept it like that, as if nothing unusual had happened, and in a way it hadn’t. Gerard knew that someday, the two of them would be separated from each other and the older one would have to take the biggest blow - being the one thrown out of the house. It was something he wasn’t scared of any longer, but the fact that he had to leave his brother? That was the one thing he never wanted to do.

“What are you gonna do?” Ray asked the brothers carefully, and the two of them exchanged looks.

“I guess I’m gonna leave and let Gerard stay, if that’s okay?” Mikey said, and Gerard bit his bottom lip, thinking.

He didn’t want to leave Mikey, but at the same time he knew his parents would get angrier the longer time that went until Mikey got home. They would get him home, that was for sure, and Gerard did put the slightest of trust in his parents that they wouldn't hurt his brother - the slightest of trust. But he knew that he would never be able to feel at ease if Mikey wasn’t somewhere that Gerard knew wouldn’t hurt him. His mind told him to let him go back home but his heart told him to stay.

“I- I guess so,” Gerard heard himself say, almost shocking himself. “There’s nothing else we can do really.”

“You could bring the police-”

“No, Ray,” Gerard stopped him and looked his friend dead in the eye. “Don’t bring the cops into this bullshit, it’s not that serious, really. They have more important things to focus on than this bullshit, okay? Thank you.” Ray and his mother glanced at each other, obviously worried for Gerard and how he would be emotionally provoked by everything. He was always the more emotional of the brothers, and you never really knew what went on in Mikey’s head - he had quite mastered the poker face.

Silence coated them like a thick mist, and to Gerard, that was the best. He didn’t really know what to say anyways. His mind was tripping over itself, running around in mazes that it had created but still couldn’t find the way out of. He couldn't think properly, couldn’t grasp the thought that Mikey was going to leave him to live with their parents. Their parents - who Gerard barely even classified as parents - didn’t even want him there. He felt like that person in the team that sucked ass at whatever you were doing and just brought everyone down. Like when you played team on Mario Kart, he was the one who landed in 12th place and made the team lose by one point.

He didn’t want to leave Mikey, no fucking way that he wanted to do that, but at the same time he knew that his parents could be harsh. He was conflicted between the two alternatives, even if he knew that Mikey would have to leave. Gerard didn’t want that, his brother was a lifeline for him. A shoulder to cry on, someone whom he could talk to about small, cute and innocent butterflies all the way to grotesque sex positions. His best friend, partner in crime, Watson, Ernie, Robin - his brother.

“I guess it’s best if I go then,” Mikey mumbled, trying his best at catching the other three’s gazes, who all looked down to the ground. “Mom and dad will go all psycho otherwise, and I suppose no one wants to meet their rage.”

Those words made something in Gerard sting, but he held the tears back and looked up at Mikey. “Yeah, I guess so… Donna and Donald will hopefully want me back in a few days or so. There’s nothing to do about it anyways, don’t want to start a fight, right?” The younger Way nodded slowly at that, obviously doubting the certainty in Gerard’s voice.

“We’ll wash your clothes, Mikey,” Mrs. Toro informed the teen. “One of us will make sure to deliver it to you in one of the upcoming days, so no need to worry.” Mikey - fake - smiled at her and yet another silence covered the room. It wasn’t awkward, it was just that no one wanted to say goodbye in any sort of form. Sure, they would meet up at school and Mikey could go to Ray’s place whenever he wanted, but it felt as if they were going to say their last goodbyes. And it was killing Gerard.

“See ya tomorrow at school,” Mikey said and waved weakly at his brother and Ray. “Thanks for letting me stay, Mrs. Toro.” The woman smiled at him, eyes filled with tears as if she was saying goodbye to her son who was leaving for the army. She had become a bit too attached to the brothers, she noticed.

Mikey grabbed his school back and slung it over his shoulder, leaving the house as he closed the door softly behind him. Gerard immediately bolted to the kitchen to where you could see out on the street, and he saw his brother making his way in the direction of their house. He didn’t notice the redhead though, and at the realization Gerard felt his heart fall down to the pit of his stomach. His eyes immediately started to tear up again, and only in a matter of seconds he was crying.

His legs gave up under him, and he fell to the ground with a thud. Both Ray and Mrs. Toro came barging into the room, and started to comfort Gerard where he sat on the floor - unable to get up. It was as if every muscle in his legs just had stopped working, and the only thing he could do was to cry and sob. Cry and sob. His heart nor mind could handle so many thoughts bundled up inside of him, and it wasn’t until now that the redhead realized how much his brother meant to him.

The two of them had always been close. They used to play with arts and crafts, everything from throwing clay at each other to making drawings of dragons and pretending to be them. They would build a little tent inside, and in the late evening they would lie there. Gerard usually read from one of his comic books, flashlight lightening up the pictures as he read what the little speech bubbles said for his brother. They were his fondest memories, and all of them just came flooding back at him at the same time.

That was also the time when their parents didn’t hate Gerard. When they shared their love for them equally as much, and it stung so bad inside of Gerard that he thought that he might actually trigger a heart attack. It was too painful for him to think of, and everything suddenly turned hazy around him as he tried to fixate his gaze on his friend. Black spots appeared in front of him, and a loud buzzing noise filled his ears.

Oh god, Gerard started to panic as he reached out for the other two. Tears were almost flowing down his eyes, and he started to hyperventilate as he let out short but pained screams. His whole body started to tremble, and then everything went totally numb in the matter of a second.

He fainted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> everyone are crying 24/7 here just like me eeEYYY


	6. Illegal Things You Can Do With A Motocross Bike And Lame Attempts At Flirting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sick for the third time in like a month and two weeks UUGH

He was empty. Almost too empty, almost as if he was drained of emotions and was nothing than a dumb, lanky, weird shell. A cloud of dust in a world of nothingness, that was how he felt basically. It was as if he didn’t matter anymore.

Mikey took his bottom lip in between his teeth, a bad habit that both he and his brother had developed. Both of them had chapped lips, not because they were dry but after pulling at the skin of them. The main reason to why they did that was because of trying to contain themselves whenever their parents would complain on Mutants or their respective brother. They had learned to shut up from a long time ago, but at times they just wanted to bite back. Gerard did that at times, but Mikey was mostly quiet. He was always the more quiet and calm one.

The noodle teen crossed the streets, his long legs carrying him quickly over to the other side. The Way resident came into view not too long after that, and Mikey felt the anxiety creeping up on his back. For each step he got closer to his home the more and more he wanted to turn back around. He had put on a big boy persona, sure, but he was actually scared to death to go back to them. Their parents scared the living shit out of Mikey, and for a good number of reasons too.

The door was unlocked when Mikey got to the house, and he stepped in as if nothing had happened. He quickly noticed that it wasn’t like normal however, and the bag he had slung over his shoulder slowly fell down to the floor.

In front of him was trash bags, some of them closed and others not. He couldn’t see everything that was in the bags - obviously - but from what was visible they were filled with Gerard’s stuff. Or more precisely, his precious drawings. He had millions of them, and they took up two whole drawers. The majority of them weren’t finished, but all of them still meant something to Gerard. He’d always doodle some text next to the drawing, stuff like “coffee’s nice”, “death to humanity” and “the weather is cloudy” were only a few of the random things he’d written. But Mikey knew that they meant something to Gerard, only something that he himself could understand.

“Oh, Michael,” Donna said as she made her way up from the basement. “You’re finally home, I see, how nice. Maybe you could help me with taking out your brother’s things from the basement? I didn’t know he had put up his territory there as well.” She sounded disgusted as she finished the sentence, but smiled at her youngest son only a second later.

“What are you doing with all of Gee’s things?” Mikey asked as he picked up his bag from the ground. Donna seemed to cringe slightly at the nickname given to her oldest son, and she put down the box she was holding onto the ground.

“We're just moving a few things into the garage for the moment, nothing drastic,” she explained calmly. Even if her voice was calm, her face expression wasn’t. She looked like a maniac, someone who was ready to kill any second, and it scared the teen. Donna was - according to Mikey - starting to lose grip on reality, something he had noticed a while ago. She was most likely starting to stress over her job, as she had recently gotten demoted. That was no excuse however to throw away all of Gerard’s things, no way in hell it was.

“Where’s dad?”

“He’s still at work, he had to add an hour to his working hours as to earn more money,” Donna answered her son, who only snorted at that. “What was that supposed to mean, son?” She bit at him, obviously hearing Mikey’s snort.

“Uh, nothing, sorry,” Mikey mumbled quietly and ran a hand through his hair,another habit he had developed, although this one was more recent. “Do we really have to throw away of Gerard’s things though? I really like most of the drawings he does, they’re really pretty…” Donna didn’t seem to agree with what he said, and she hastily made her way over to Mikey with an angry look plastered onto her face.

“What I’m currently doing is none of your business. Go up to your room, now,” her voice was sharp, cutting the air around them like a knife. Mikey didn’t feel like fighting back, and so he nodded his head in shame and passed her by. He got a quick look down in the basement, and it was completely trashed. Sure, it was messy when Gerard had resided there, but now it was as if someone had a mental breakdown and ruined everything down there. It was no longer Gerard’s safe space, where he would go whenever he and their parents would have a fight. He practically lived down there.

The door to Gerard’s room on the second floor was closed however, and Mikey didn’t dare to snoop around, for the fear of his mother coming onto him. Instead he only walked into his room, closing the door behind him quietly. His room looked like it had done two days ago, bed messy, floor scattered with homework and walls covered with posters. The only difference now was on the door, where there no longer was a lock.

No more locking himself in his room then.

Mikey tidied his room up, trying to make it look as presentable as possible. For some reason the room smelled like Gerard, something that pained the tall teen. It hadn’t even gone by twenty minutes and he already missed him. They were away from each other on school days, but then Mikey knew that he would get to meet his brother at the end of the day. But now, he didn’t even know if he ever would get to meet him. Maybe Gerard would have to stay at Ray’s house until he graduated; and the thought scared Mikey.

He wasn’t ready to lose his brother, someone who stood so close to him was never to be lost until they were at least over sixty years old. Gerard was everything and nothing to him, however that made sense. He could be everything in the whole world to Mikey, but at the same time he could be so much that Gerard became the world itself. The younger one looked up to his brother as if he was some sort of God, and he kind of was, at least according to the younger Way. He had always adored his brother, always wanting to turn out to be like him, always wanting to be as talented like him - always wanting to be right by his side. But it wasn’t until now that Mikey realized that it was impossible.

He felt tears prickle his eyes, and he took in a deep breath. His thoughts were spinning too much, revolving around the only person he shouldn’t be thinking about. Mikey had to force himself as not to think of the coffee addicted redhead, and so he instead focused his thoughts on more important things - homework. He had gotten to borrow one of Ray’s brothers bags - Mikey realized he had to give that back as well - and had to rely on the material he had in his locker. Thankfully, Patrick was nice enough to let him borrow his Biology book, he was however empty handed when it came to English and History. Mr. Armstrong had never really liked the teen anyways.

As a way of suppressing his thoughts he settled on doing homework, and it actually helped him to get on other thoughts. It was about two hours of intense studying later, that Mikey heard his father yell at him from downstairs. He immediately started to feel uneasy, but he quickly made his way to the first floor as not to piss off his parents. They didn’t like when their sons didn’t answer them immediately, which could be a problem if someone listened to music.

Donna and Donald were standing by the coffee table that was in front of the couch, and Donald motioned for his son to sit down. Mikey wasted no time in sitting down, and he regretted it as fast as he sat down in the worn-out leather couch.

“We need to talk about Gerard,” Donna began, and Donald nodded beside her with a serious face expression clearly visible on his face. “We are very aware of your close relationship, and we don’t blame you for being so close with him as you are brothers. We however think that maybe you should try to distance yourself from him,” she stopped talking, as a way of Mikey getting the time to process everything. It didn't help however, he was still as empty. He didn't feel anything.

“You know that we only do this for your own personal best,” Donald said and it seemed like he tried to sympathize with Mikey, something that didn’t bite the teen. “We came to a conclusion that Gerard is a bad influence on you. If it wasn’t for him we don’t believe you would have made such a foolish decision like running away from home, something I do not want to say ever again. That was very immature of you, Michael.”

“Basically what we want to say to you, it will probably be the best for all of us if Gerard got a little cooling down period,” Donna continued on her husband’s words. “We don’t blame you for what you did, Gerard probably persuaded you into doing what you did, so there's no need to blame yourself. We love you anyways, and we will always do.”

“What about Gerard, do you love him?” Mikey questioned, voice monotone and cold. He didn’t want to hear anything about how Gerard wasn’t the son they wanted, but how Mikey was the only one that mattered. He wanted to be blamed for what he did, he didn’t want Gerard to get the blame. He didn’t want to stay in the house, and went with on his brother’s idea. Gerard would have listened if Mikey had something to say, and Mikey would have said something if it was bothering him. Gerard would have taken every single word with consideration - he would never intentionally hurt Mikey.

“We love Gerard too, honey-”

“Clearly you don’t, you seem to blame him a lot more than me when it was I who went along with what he did,” Mikey’s voice was stable and clear to the point, but inside he was falling apart, piece by piece. “You don’t have the right to give him the entire blame, I contributed to it as well. You can’t just go around-”

“Enough!” Donald roared and smashed his fist to the coffee table, making Mikey visibly flinch. “We are trying to forgive you for what you did, son. But you just sit here and try to fight back against us, pitiful. We love Gerard, but we are done with his schemes. We just think it will be for the best if he’s going to stay at the Toro house, Mrs. Toro agreed that he could stay there, so you should just shut your damn mouth before we send you over there as well.”

Mikey wanted to say something. He wanted to fight back, to tell his father that he would gladly go back to the Toro house rather than being with his parents. But he didn’t have enough confidence, and instead he nodded his head pitifully. He was submitting to them, of course, but without Gerard by his side Mikey felt like nothing. Gerard would always be the stronger brother, no matter what.

“I hope you understand our reasoning,” Donna said and sat down next to Mikey, taking his bony hands in hers. “We just want the best for you and your brother. We love both of you very much, okay?” Mikey didn’t answer. He just shrugged and tilted his head side to side, not really caring about either of his parents. “We’ll prepare some dinner, you can go back up to your room.” The teen practically bounced up from the couch, not sparing a single glance to his parents. He couldn’t face them, it was too painful.

As fast as he had gotten to his room, Mikey closed the door and took out his phone from his hoodie’s pocket. He quickly dialed the one person he thought he was at least allowed to speak to, and if his parents asked him he wouldn’t have to lie to them.

“Hello, Mikey, what’s smoking?”

“W-what? Patrick, don’t ever say that again, please,” Mikey said and threw himself onto his bed, accidentally cracking his back in the process. “Well erm… I don’t know how to say this really… but like-”

“You’re gay?”

“What? No, Patrick, stop saying such weird things. Although I like guys so I guess you’re-”

“We can be gay buddies!”

“Patrick,” Mikey sighed, totally ignoring the fact that his kind-of-friend just told him he was gay - even if Mikey already had his suspicions over that. “I need your advice on this one thing - and no it doesn’t have anything to do with my sexuality so please be quiet. Gerard and my parents recently had this fight and all, and Gee’s currently staying over at Ray’s place which means that I'm alone with my scary parents. I am officially freaking out on the inside and I’m torn between killing someone and crying.”

It went silent on the other side of the line, and Mikey started to impatiently chew on his bottom lip. Patrick sighed heavily, and seemed to carefully think over what he was supposed to say. “Well I guess your parents have the right to be mad at Gerard… But it’s also unnecessary to kick him out-”

“They didn’t, he willingly left the house.”

“Mikey, I can see through you, even if I can’t see you physically. I’ve mastered the ability to see through lies long ago.”

“That makes me really uncomfortable, you know,” Mikey mumbled and sat up, only to run a hand through his messy hair. “But yeah, I guess. Well me and Gee left the house about two days ago, and today I got back home since mom and dad wanted me back an all… But they didn’t want Gerard back yet because they thought he needed some sort of “cooling down period”. Just a few minutes ago I spoke to them and they told me to kind of stay away from Gerard. Well they didn’t outspokenly tell me, but I understood what they meant.”

“Do you usually fight?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess so. Well, Gerard and mom and dad usually fight, I just kind of stand in the corner of everything. This time it may just got a little bit out of hand? I really don’t feel comfortable going into detail, but it crossed the line of the usual fights between us. They’re still mad at Gerard even if I was the one who caused the chaos. I have no idea what he did to get them so pissed, I never asked him. He probably fought back, trying his best at protecting me. Fun, huh?”

“Mikey, this is serious,” Patrick’s empty tone said on the other side, and Mikey immediately started to get nervous. He should never have called Patrick in the first place. “If your parents are abusing-”

“They’re not, okay? You can’t go and accuse people like that, it’s not acceptable. Seriously, you’re pissing me off,” Mikey’s words became mumbled at the end, making Patrick sigh.

“Okay, I’m sorry for making such claims. It was not right of me and I apologize, better?” When Mikey didn’t answer, Patrick continued on. “I know you’re into bad shit at times, I’ve heard that from the book club my mom holds, or the gossiping club - as I like to call it. The Way family is not necessarily known as the good ones in our town, the lastname Way has a bad taste in people’s mouths. Not that it means you or your brother are bad people- did you even know this?”

Mikey started to chew on his bottom lip again, peeing away some of the skin, making it turn red. Bad habits never wore off, especially not in the Way household where nothing ever left. He knew that they were a bad family, but it was mostly rumors, never anything confirmed. From what Mikey knew however, both Donna and Donald used to be rebellious teenagers. People would compare them to Bonnie and Clyde at times, which may have been a little bit over the top. When they had their first child, everyone in the town knew to sympathize with it. Something was always off with the Way parents; and people were just waiting to see when their sons would crack.

“I just don’t know what to do,” Mikey mumbled and started to pull at a loose thread on his shirt. “What if Gerard never comes back? Will I ever see him again? Like it’s not a restraining order so they can’t refrain us from meeting each other, we have school and all. But I’m worried for him, I dunno if he’ll make it. I couldn’t even bear to look back at him when I left.”

“Mikey, don’t blame yourself for the fact that you fought.”

“But it was my fault, I was the one who started spewing some bullshit on how Mutants shouldn’t and should be treated and I was the one who triggered my parents or some bullshit. If there’s someone they should disown it should be me, Gerard shouldn’t be the one to be blamed for everything. It’s so fucking stupid that I just want to fucking strangle someone or some shit. I get away with everything, I never face any consequences and I will probably end up like a spoiled old man who thinks he can get away with anything and everything. Or become a criminal, who the fuck knows, I don’t know because I’m actually fucking dumb. God I hate everything so much right now.” A low groan left Mikey’s throat, something that seemed to trigger something in Patrick as he let out something you can describe as an uncomfortable sigh.

“You shouldn’t blame yourself, Mikey,” Patrick's voice came out as warm and soothing, a way he used to manipulate it to get people to calm down. “It’s not good for you. Gerard doesn’t blame you, from the little I know him and from the little I know of your close relation, I believe he blames himself as well. It’s no one’s fault in the case, you stood up for what you thought was right. I have no idea how your parents reacted, but from the situation you’re in now it seems like something grave happened. I won't make any assumptions however, I just don’t want you to blame anyone, okay?”

Mikey didn’t answer. His mind was too wrapped around the whole situation. It was fucked up to him, how his parents just would leave Gerard like that. He never understood why they liked the younger one more than the older, it made no sense what-so-fucking-ever. For the longest time ever Mikey has wished for a functional family, like Ray’s, but no. He was unfortunate enough to get Donna and Donald as his parents. He could literally have been birthed from Satan and it would have been better for him. Okay maybe not, but it certainly felt like it.

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow instead, thanks,” Mikey muttered. Patrick immediately started to protest, but Mikey only ended the call without a second thought. He didn’t feel like talking, he was too emotionally drained for that. Even if they hadn’t known each other for too long, Mikey had spilled one of his many problems in his short lived life to Patrick. But there was just something about the short teen that made people rely on him. He had that sort of aura to him.

Mikey’s phone screen lit up, Patrick’s name being the thing that caught his eye. He declined the call however, and then set the phone on flight mode. After throwing his phone further away on the bed, and just sat there, silence covering him like a blanket. It felt nice. No one yelling at him to do something, no one yelling at him for wanting to hang out with him, no one yelling in general. The only thing you could hear was Donna and Donald preparing food from downstairs, and a faint conversation taking place between them.

Deciding to actually do something, Mikey crawled off the bed and onto the floor, over to his homework. It was a great way to push his emotions and thoughts away, a perfect distraction for the moment. Mikey must be one of the very few people who actually enjoyed doing homework - even if it wasn’t out of genuine enjoyment. Some people may feel stress over getting homework, Mikey could feel stress over not having homework. Homework was the equivalent to alcohol for him.

Time flew by as he wrote page after page about the effect humans have on the environment and how the world could look like in 100 years. It was boring as hell, and Mikey couldn’t really say that he even cared about the subject in question - he would die anyways and so would everyone else, they had already ruined the Earth.

The teen spent the rest of the afternoon doing homework, maybe not the funniest thing in the world but better than sitting in his loneliness worrying over life. He came down to eat when dinner was ready, but quickly emerged back to his room to continue with homework. He overheard how Donna and Donald praised the boy for being so diligent and how he was already making better progress on school without Gerard’s distraction.

Mikey called it bullshit, but he didn’t want to cause another fight and decided not to comment on it. Instead he stayed in his room for the rest of the evening, leaving only once to go for a bathroom break. He knew it wasn’t good to stay so focused on homework, and especially not as a coping method, but he didn’t feel like talking about it. Mikey had never been one for emotions, a man with few words is what most probably would describe him. Or a teen with few words, he may be tall but that was about it.

3 am soon rolled in, it was about then when Mikey decided to stop out of pure exhaustion. His body was stiff in some places, like his spine, that practically had died as he couldn’t feel it for shit. Mikey concluded that doing homework while lying on your stomach wasn’t the most effective way to do it, at least not for hours.

He changed clothes into his nightwear - a slightly oversized The Misfits shirt - and crawled into his messy bed. Mikey reminded himself to check his phone, and inactivated flight mode. A few seconds later and messages, missed calls notices and other notices popped up, and Mikey sighed heavily. He really didn’t feel like answering Patrick, Ray nor his brother - but he seemed it necessary and told all three of them that he was okay and that Donna and Donald had done nothing but been nice to him.

He didn’t want to worry anyone any further.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

The alarm clock went off at 06:45, and Mikey groaned loudly as he tossed and turned in his bed. He let the alarm go off for another few seconds, until the sound became too unbearable and he turned it off. He laid in bed another few minutes, but forced himself to get up as the sun felt like creeping through the blinds and hit him right in the face.

He started off his morning by getting dressed in the bathroom, trying his best to make his hair look as presentable as possible. A few months ago, only a few days before the summer break, Gerard had colored his hair a furious red. But he didn’t want to be the only who did so, and he somehow managed to convince Mikey to bleach his hair blond as well as get a new haircut. He couldn’t say that he disliked it, he actually liked his look, but the way that his hair was cut it could be near impossible to get it to look right.

After about five agonizing minutes in the bathroom, Mikey made his way downstairs to prepare for some coffee. As that was brewing he made himself two sandwiches, and sat down on of the counters to eat them. He scrolled through his social media, seeing everything from cute puppies to a picture of a shirtless Pete Wentz, totally not for people to see his abs and cream over how hot he was. It was totally not getting to Mikey, he totally didn’t think Pete was hot, who even thought that anyways?

He liked the photo anyways - just as sympathy, Pete had only gotten about 237 likes in half an hour - and continued to scroll. He saw yet another angst post by Frank - “you were the only person who believed in me” the caption said - and a few others by celebrities he liked. He wasn’t necessarily social on social media, it was mostly to see what everyone else were up to. His last post was of him and Gerard, which he posted for about thirty six weeks ago. Mikey was never known for being the social one of the brothers.

After eating up and drinking his coffee, the teen checked the clock. It was about seven-forty, and school started at eight. The walk to his school would take about fifteen minutes, but if he hurried Mikey could hopefully make it to there in ten. He knew that he could probably call Ray and ask to pick him up, but because of yesterday he didn’t feel like it. It’s not like he had anything to do at home anyways, and he actually liked walking to school at times. And bus wasn’t an option.

He put on his leather jacket, took his school bag and locked the door after him. The bright sun almost blinded him, and the fresh scents of the outside wasn’t something he enjoyed. Most people probably liked the outside when it was fresh, but Mikey really hated it, whenever he was in sour mood at least.

He plugged in his earbuds, trying his best at ignoring the small amount of people around him. He was never a people person, nor an extrovert. Being the introverted one of the brothers, he was always the one to be introduced to Gerard’s friends. Ray has he known ever since he was born basically, and Brendon was he introduced to when Gerard started elementary school. Mikey did have his own set of friends when he was younger, but their differences made them grow apart.

Mikey had gotten about five minutes into his walk to school when he felt a preference next to him. He glanced over to his left, and saw a guy clad in a leather jacket, black ripped skinny jeans, beat up converse and with a helmet on his head, slowly walking beside him as he sat on a motocross bike. Curiosity got the better of Mikey, and so he took out one of his earbuds and stopped walking, which made the guy stop as well.

“You want a ride?” The guy’s muffled voice asked, and Mikey raised an eyebrow at him.

“I literally have no idea- oh,” the guy had taken off his helmet, only to relieve Pete behind the mask in the most anticlimactic way ever. “Uh no thanks, I’m totally fine walking to school, if you don't mind. Also, I thought it was illegal to ride a motocross bike on none dirt roads? Don’t you have to go through all of these law things to be able to drive them? Because they are only made for going on dirt roads?”

“Where the fuck have you heard that?” Pete asked, trying his best at hiding his laughter. It didn’t go too well, as he had a big ass grin on his lips. But then again Pete always had a shit eating grin on his face so that wasn’t an exception.

Mikey raised an unimpressed eyebrow at the teen, and rolled his eyes like a fifteen year old girl - which he basically was. “I think God sent me a message to me when I was asleep, and he educated me on motocross bikes. It was very fun,” Pete raised his eyebrows at that, as if he believed it, which he probably did. “Okay no not really because I’m an Atheist so I don't believe in God. Well my religion basically consists of having no religion whatsoever, a pretty good one in my opinion but now I’m really getting off track here shit eh…” silence formed between the two, and Mikey could easily have started to walk again. For some reason however, it was as if his feet were glued to the ground. God had probably been offended by his comments and punished him by having to stand still in front of Pete.

“But come on, dude, it won’t hurt or anything,” Pete tried to reason, running a hand through his jet black hair, probably as a way of trying to persuade Mikey. It totally wasn’t working, nope. “We may have a police department a good few minutes away from here, but that’s because we used to be like this awful crime place like thirty years ago. We don’t have a fire department nor hospital, and the police are barely active here. We live in a town where no one cares, we could literally do some bat shit crazy stuff like starting to fuck on the street and people would go; “oh hey I saw that just a few months ago what a coincidence”. Okay now I over exaggerated but ya get what I mean.”

Mikey did understand, because it was practically true, their town was shitty as fuck. But the problem didn’t lie in the fact that what they did would be illegal in more than one way, but the fact that it involved Pete Wentz. He didn’t want to be associated with Pete, even if most teens Mikey’s age probably would kill to be friends with the guy. Now it could also be that Pete saw Mikey as someone to fuck and then leave, but others had started to take notice to their occasional chatting and said that it was very unlike of Pete to actually give a damn about the people he wanted to bang. It wasn’t like Mikey wanted to speak to him, he was just so damn captivating. He understood why everyone seemed to be friends with the junior, he was funny, hot, charming and popular. He was the ultimate high school boyfriend.

“You don't have two helmets,” Mikey tried to object, but Pete only shrugged and handed him the helmet he previously had on. “That won’t help for fucks sake, you'll have no helmet.”

Pete laughed lightly, and shook his head. “Ah god, Michael. I’ve driven this thing thousands of times without my helmet on, and I’ve never gotten into any accidents. And before you say either “but Pete, the one time you don’t use your helmet will be the one you regret it” or “you’ll just try to style and get us into an accident” - no. I am experienced, I know what I’m doing, have faith in me even if you don’t believe in God. Just trust me, okay?”

“I don’t trust people easily, also don’t call me Michael,” Mikey muttered, making Pete groan loudly. “I don’t want to break it to you, but I'm not interested in fucking nor having you as a friend. Sorry, but I’m not the right guy.”

“Why must you be so fucking hard to understand?”

“Don’t you enjoy being the cat?” Mikey teased, a small smirk creeping up on his lips.

“Actually, I’m used to being the mouse so no,” Pete deadpanned, eyebrows furrowed. “I’ve just wasted like three minutes of your time which will make you a tad bit late for school. Also why the fuck are you going so early? Why not take the fucking bus?”

“The bus is filled with disgusting kids like you who will throw insults at me because I’m wearing a The Smashing Pumpkins shirt and then I'm apparently either old, emo or gay which I in no way understand,” Mikey answered truthfully. He didn’t really like kids his age. “Also I usually walk this “early” because I like being “early” to school. School is basically my second home even if I hate the people there, but then again the people at home aren’t much better. Why the fuck are you going this early when you have a fucking motocross bike and will be at school in less than five minutes?”

“Can you stop asking so many questions and just get on this fucking bike with me?” Pete pleaded with an irritated voice. Mikey had apparently dragged out their conversation for too long, which seemed to annoy the other teen. Maybe he wasn’t as patient as Mikey had thought, at least it didn’t seem like so. Pete was after all used to get what he wanted, when he wanted, person or object. But a person was basically an object in his eyes so there was no real difference between those things.

“Fine, just because you wasted my time and I feel sympathy for your awful way of trying to get me over to the dark side,” Mikey said and took the helmet from Pete. “Also, don’t try anything funny, okay? My brother would kill me if he ever found out.” It stung a little inside of him as he mention his brother, but Pete didn’t seem to notice as he only winked at the teen, which apparently was a very good distraction. Mikey quickly put on the helmet as to avoid Pete from seeing the maybe-not-so-visible-maybe-very-visible blush on his cheeks, and he redirected his bag so it was on his back instead of hip.

“You can count on me, Mikeyway,” Pete said and flashed him an award winning smile. It didn’t bite on the younger teen however, as he only threw one of his legs over the passenger part of the seat. Mikey had barely set his hands on the last small part of the seat before Pete had sped off, much to his dismay. Pete was definitely a speed freak, and it was clearly visible with the way he drove the motocross bike. He seemed comfortable enough on it however, so Mikey decided not to worry too much. It would probably be a lot safer for him if he wrapped his arms around Pete’s waist, but there was no way in hell that he would do that. He’d much rather fall of the damn bike.

They were in maybe three to four minutes, Pete liked to go over the speed limit Mikey noticed. He quickly jumped off the bike and took his the helmet, ruffling around his hair which now probably looked like shit. Pete jumped off as well, and flashed Mikey a big grin. “Wasn’t too bad was it? I mean maybe I went a little bit too fast at some parts but no police, no maintenance.”

“Yeah, a little bit too fast at some parts, right,” Mikey said and gave back the helmet to Pete as he redirected his bag again. “Remind me to never ever go with you again, I could have been killed for fucks sake. Or well I can actually die anytime when I’m in traffic or some bullshit, I actually have a higher rate of dying in my own house which is where I should feel the most uncomfortable in but whatever there's no people so it’s better. I am rambling way too much I know.”

“Nah, it’s fine, I like hearing you talk,” Pete winked at the taller teen, who rolled his eyes as a way of brushing off the compliment and trying his hardest not to blush - again. “See you later though, message me when you’ve finished, make sure to wait for me.”

“Wait what, I don’t-” in the blink of an eye Pete had gotten Mikey’s phone out of his jacket’s pocket, and the younger one wonder how he knew it was in that exact pocket.

“What’s your code?” Pete asked without looking up from the phone. “Cute background by the way, you and Gerard are very close I see.”

“Yeah, no shit Sherlock and I won't tell you my-”

“I got in, it’s fine,” Pete interrupted and Mikey blinked at him. “Your code was literally Gerard but with the fucking numbers, don’t you think I’ve hacked into my fair share of phones before? If I can’t guess the password of one of my friend’s phone then I must be an awful friend.”

“We’re not friends, barely acquaintances,” Mikey mumbled and ran a hand through his unruly hair. “Also, what kind of friendship do you have with your friends? Oh wait, you’re Pete Wentz, no surprise there.” When Pete didn’t answer but instead typed out on his phone, Mikey started to grow impatient. He didn’t have the time say anything before the shorter of the two clicked his tongue.

“There you go,” He said and handed Mikey back his phone. “See you!” He winked one last time before he made his way over to the school. Mikey was left standing there, hand in phone and face laced with confusion. He looked down at his phone, which was opened on a contact. “Hottie” it said, and Mikey was torn between laughing and yelling at Pete to fuck off. He was so done at this point however, that he didn't even have enough care in his body to change the name to something reasonable. Pete was impossible to deal with, that was true.

The teen barely got a meter or so forward when he heard someone yell his name, and he turned around to see Patrick running towards him. The short boy was huffing and puffing, pushing up his glasses on his nose. When he got to Mikey he so out of breath that Mikey even started to worry if he would pass out because of the limited air he got.

“Patrick, are you okay?” Mikey asked and tilted his head to the side, raising an eyebrow curiously at him. “It seems to me like you are dying, but so am I 24/7 so there’s no surprise there really. Actually all of us are dying all the time, since we are aging it basically means we're on our way to die, but slowly. Isn’t that a scary thought though? The fact that we’re dying but we can literally do nothing about it?”

“Well… well good morning to you- you too,” Patrick panted out, looking what you could somewhat describe as close to death. “Was that Pete?”

“Uh, yeah I got a ride from him this morning, met him on my way to school,” Mikey rubbed the back of his neck as he told Patrick, as if he was embarrassed by it - which he was to an extent. “But like I promise there’s nothing whatsoever going on between us, he just asked me if I needed a ride and then gave me his number because he wanted to give me a ride back home and it’s just about now that I truly realize he’s hitting on me oh god no.”

Patrick giggled, and patted Mikey on one of his shoulders. “It’s okay, it’s Pete we’re talking about. If you don’t like the fact that he’s not so subtly flirting with you, you can just tell him to fuck off. But since we’re speaking of Pete I don’t think he’ll fuck off even if you tell him too, he’s way too far up his own ass. You also look fucking hot in that jacket.”

Patrick’s new and sudden personality change made Mikey question if the boy was drunk and or high. When he first meet him - which was like four days ago - he was shy, scared and insecure. But all of a sudden it seemed as switch or something had flipped in his mind, and now he was this badass, cool yet small Patrick. Maybe Patrick was this hardcore little guy, who everyone thought was puny but in real life was some sort of mafia boss. It wouldn’t surprise Mikey really.

“Pete flirts with everyone, I know, he’ll hopefully lose interest in a while. But for the moment I’ll just use him as easy transportation to school,” Mikey winked - God Pete was brushing off - at Patrick and he turned around as he started to walk towards the school again, the smaller one following. “Thanks for the compliment by the way. Gerard is usually the jacket slut but I can enjoy being one as well, I’m the closeted case. Also I love the fact that you call me fucking hot after just four days of knowing me, never had a friendship grow that fast.”

“Well I had to be honest with you, you look hot!” Patrick exclaimed, making Mikey let out a very short lived laughter. “On the topic of your brother; anything you want to keep talking about since yesterday?” They skipped up the stairs, Patrick almost falling in the process.

“Not really,” Mikey answered and opened the door for them both. “I kinda got the emotions out of me in my own way, but thanks for your concern dude. I guess it was pretty weird for you and I apologize, I’m not really great at expressing feelings, so to say. But thanks for not like, abandoning me and not saying some shit like; “you’re weird” and hanging up on me.”

“No problem, I’m not the kind of friend who abandons people. I’ve had friends who just haven’t been able to keep up with me, and so they’ve kind of just left me. I never understood why, maybe they thought I was a burden with all of my emotions. I only have like one childhood friend left, or well we’re not directly friends any longer but whatever, it’s not important really. Right now our concentration should be directed towards you, my dear friend,” Patrick tried his best at slinging an arm over Mikey’s shoulders, which proved to be a lot harder than he originally thought. Mikey was apparently - clearly - a good few inches taller than him, much to Patrick’s dismay.

The two split up as they didn’t share their first lesson, something that got Mikey in a slight sour mood. As he got to the first lesson - History - he whipped out his phone, and to his surprise he saw a text from Ray. It said that Gerard would be staying at home as he was apparently sick, and Mikey replied with a simple okay.

He knew that it wasn't just some sickness or a cold, but that Gerard was emotionally drained. Yesterday had obviously taken its toll on him and even if Mikey wasn’t there to see him he could feel it. He was his brother after all, and they were practically glued at the hip at times. A lot of people would even say they had their own idioglossia. Even if they didn’t, they understood what people meant, they could even creep each other out at times.

When Mikey was by his locker on his second period, Brendon popped out of fucking nowhere and scared the living shit out of the teen, which made the older one laugh so hard that he head butted into a locker close by. Brendon was only there to ask about Gerard however - most likely to copy his homework. He blamed it on missing the red haired lad, and when Mikey told him he was sick something inside of Brendon seemed to die. Probably his ego, but it would revive itself just like it had done a million times before. The-boy-with-the-red-forehead left quickly after that, most likely to chase after someone else who could have done their homework.

Mikey had never really liked Brendon. He was a bit too flamboyant, loud and energetic for his taste. He was also way too comfortable about his sexuality that it had started to creep Mikey out. About a year ago Brendon, Gerard and Ray were having a little gathering as Donna and Donald were out of town. A little gathering meant booze, and Brendon seemed to have a liking for drinking alcohol at a young age. He ended up in Mikey’s room and threw up on his floor as well as passing out. Gerard and Ray found it to be hilarious, Mikey not so much. Brendon had apologized a gazillion times, but the younger one never really forgave him.

The two sophomores met during lunch and ate together. During the time they ate Mikey got a message from Pete, who asked if if they were supposed to have their meeting with Martha, something they did not. The old woman had officially said that Friday would be the only day that they didn’t get to go and train their powers, as everyone wanted to go home as quick as possible in a Friday. Pete had actually protested about it himself, as he apparently had soccer practice right after school.

Mikey frowned at the thought, and he quickly decided to call Pete, who picked up just after the first signal.

“What’s up, babe?” Pete asked teasingly as he picked up, which made Mikey cringe.

“Okay do not ever call me babe again, just no,” Mikey deadpanned. “Also, you remember this morning when you said you would drive me back to my house? Yeah, you have fucking soccer practice after school.”

“You were actually thinking of joining me? Aw, how cute. But my last lesson end at 14:45, it’s an early day for me.”

“How long is your soccer practice? I finish at 15:15, and there’s no way that your soccer practice is just half an hour long,” Mikey was starting to get pissed, and didn’t really know why. “I’ll just go or some shit. Sorry for bothering you, I was too lazy to text because you text as if you were a ten year old.”

“Wait, I may think that I can go earlier from practice today,” Pete said, sounding what you could describe as nervous. “Go to the soccer field after you’ve finished, ya?” Mikey squirmed in his seat, eyeing Patrick who was focusing on his food more than anything else.

Mikey sighed but agreed, earning a happy yell from Pete. He ended the call and put the phone back in his jeans pocket, looking up to see Patrick staring at him with his blue green eyes. It scared Mikey in the slightest, and he slowly but surely raised on one of his pointy eyebrows. “Patrick?” He asked softly.

“It’s nothing, I need to go,” Patrick mumbled and stood up from his seat. “We’ll see each other on Monday.” He smiled warmly at Mikey, took his tray and walked away. The blond was left sitting by the now lonely table, blinking repeatedly as a way of trying to comprehend the situation. It was very unlike Patrick to do such things, but then again he had been acting strange the whole day. Maybe he had been replaced by a doppelgänger who had evil intentions, Mikey was sure that must have been the case.

The rest of the school day went as quick as a snail, pretty fucking slow indeed. It usually went by like a blurry blob in Mikey’s life, as he used to be pretty unconcentrated but still somehow succeed with the things he did. But for some reason the day was an awful lot worse than the others. It could have been because of his thoughts revolving around Gerard and their current family situation, it was wearing the teen out.

The Way family did get caught in a lot of fights, but a vast minority of them only ever turned violent in any sort of way. They mainly consisted of Gerard yelling at their parents, who yelled back at him. Mikey would usually get caught in between the two parties, and whenever Gerard tried to convince his little brother over to his side their parents would usually tell the younger to go to his room. That was a common punishment, to go up to his room, as if he was an eight year old again. They didn’t treat him like he was fifteen, but as if he was ten or something. But then again they were protective of him, in their own way.

After Mikey’s last lesson had ended he made his way to his locker and then the soccer field. The only times he’s ever been by the soccer field was when he had gym there, or they had some sort of important match and everyone had to watch them play. Their team wasn’t that bad, they had actually won two district championships, and ended up in third place in their region. Not too shabby, but most people would agree it was most likely because of Pete, he was the star player after all. That was probably one the many reasons why he was so loved at school.

When he got to the soccer field training was in full order, and Mikey sat down on the bleachers. The players were doing different exercises, all from passing each other, to dribbling, to what looked like penalty kicks. Mikey noticed Pete on the field. He was talking to another bunch of players, waving his arms around as he seemed to give them some sort of pep talk. After he had finished one of the players pointed towards the bleachers where Mikey sat, and Pete spun around - gracefully.

“Hey, Mikey, can ya wait for like ten minutes or so?” Pete shouted, and Mikey gave him a thumbs up. He didn’t feel like shouting over the whole field - over exaggeration - and so he did the lousy hand gesture. At most times he actually found it be ironic, probably because Gerard used it so much when he did something “great”.

He took up his phone and started to tap on that. It must have gone about two minutes until he heard someone next to him, and Mikey looked up to see Martha standing beside him. “What are you doing here? I’ve never seen you here before.” She said and sat down next to him, brushing out the unevenness that formed in her dress.

“I’m waiting for Pete, he’s supposed to give me a ride back home.”

“Oh, I didn’t think you two of all people would get along well,” she chuckled, making Mikey the slightest more uncomfortable than he was before. “Gerard never came by my art classroom today, has something happened to him?”

“Yeah, he didn’t feel well today so he stayed at home,” Mikey said, biting his bottom lip. He still didn’t feel too good talking about Gerard, but it’s not like he was going to say that to anyone. Patrick was the only one to know, and he didn’t even know the whole story, and Mikey was planning on keeping it like that.

“Well I hope he gets better, tell him my greatest wishes. Frank isn’t here today either, it was probably for the best that we didn’t have any meeting, we seem to be missing some boys. Unfortunate, maybe it’s some disease going around here, I’ll be sure to protect myself. How is your body energy training going, or have you had any time in training it?”

“No, my parents don’t know about my powers,” Mikey mumbled, picking his nails as yet another one of his bad habits. At least he got clean nails. “I haven’t gotten anywhere, I’m pretty fucking useless. Not that I thought about it, I already knew that I was useless at it. I promise you, Martha, I am to a hundred percent the worst at controlling my powers, don’t even try to make me feel better about myself.”

“Don’t use that attitude,” Martha scolded him, slapping one of his thighs which made him flinch. “I want you to think of yourself as a strong boy, no matter how dark things may seem you should always try to see the light in everything. I’ll see what I can do to get you to activate your body energy, you’re not the only one who haven’t succeeded yet. Josh and Ryan haven’t found theirs either, so I’ll help all three of you, no problem there. Maybe I’ll even pair you up.”

Mikey shrugged, not really sure on how to feel. He had barely spoken to Ryan, he was what you could call quite an odd ball. He was constantly paranoid, and kept on either bouncing one of his legs up and down or fiddling with his fingers. Josh was kinda nice though, and he had cool hair. He was also best friends with Tyler, who seemed to be pretty damn good at his powers, both in knowledge and power. Josh wasn’t as great though, having about the same amount of control over his power like Mikey.

“Hey,” a voice said, and Mikey looked up from his feet to see Pete in front of him, hair damp with sweat. “I’m just gonna go take a shower, I’m a bit smelly after all.” Mikey nodded at that, and Pete smiled as he ran away to the locker rooms.

“Interested?” Martha asked and glanced over at the teen. Mikey locked eyes with the woman, and he immediately felt his face flush red, making Martha laugh. “I’m counting on you and your control with your powers though. Don't ever doubt yourself. I’ll be supporting you all the way, okay?” She smiled warmly at him, and Mikey nodded. She wished him a nice weekend and walked away, glancing back at the boy once before she left the field.

Martha officially creeped Mikey out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I dreamt that I was Tyler and stood on a ferry and yelled "I'M HOMO BECAUSE BALLS AND BRENDON URIE" idk


	7. Awkward Conversations About Dogs That May Be Cats

Emotions; something that could be taken both as a gift or curse. It’s meant to make you feel something, something that can make you feel alive. However if you possibly get too much of these emotions it can flow over, causing something that feels like nothingness - numbness. Emotions are to be taken with consideration, carefully played around with and never to be taken for granted. They’re one of the most powerful things an individual can have, and used daily. A lot of people can easily say that they can say or do something without emotion, but that is simply not true. Whether they feel it or not is up to the individual in question, but there is always emotions lurking somewhere behind every action.

Emotions was something Gerard Way wasn’t good at controlling. They were currently all over the place, taped onto the walls, spilled on the floor, burning inside of him. The whole bedroom was basically screaming for help, waiting to be saved from the teen’s misery, sadness and hopelessness. It was all too much, even for the small particles and organisms in the room - his emotions were leaking out and spilling over.

Gerard buried his face in the soft, green pillows, almost feeling like crying again. It had been two days since Mikey had left the Toro residence to stay with their parents, and Gerard was still crying over it. He hadn’t gotten one single message from his brother other than one simple fucking okay. The older one maybe didn’t send the longest message ever - “I hope it goes okay for you, love you to the moon and back, see you” with a smiley at the end - but he couldn’t bring himself to send something longer. A few simple words should have been enough, but Gerard still felt like he just ruined their entire relation.

Okay.

A simple okay. He was basically not worth anything more than that. For all he knew Mikey cold have gone back to their parents because he didn’t want to stay with Gerard and Ray’s family. Maybe he was the one who had spilled the beans about Gerard’s Mutant powers, making their parents hate him even more than what they probably did from the beginning. For all he knew, Mikey could be secretly plotting against him with Donna and Donald to take him down.

No, Mikey would never do anything like that. He loved Gerard just as much as Gerard loved him. He would never backstab his brother, no way in hell. But maybe there was that tiny part of Mikey that just despised him, that tiny part that wanted Gerard to drown and spawn in hell only to be tortured for the rest of his life because he was basically the reincarnation of Beelzebub or something. That was probably not the case, but there was always a chance for it.

The teen sat up in his bed, looking out at the cold walls. Of course it didn’t feel like home, it wasn’t home. Home is where your loved ones are supposed to be, and home was currently not that. Gerard himself didn’t even feel like home, which didn’t surprise him that much, Mikey was a part of him and Mikey wasn’t there. Of course it would feel as if a part of him was missing.

The Toro family supported him to no end, they even promised to keep quiet about their current family situation, but yet they could never replace Gerard’s real family. Mikey was irreplaceable without a doubt, but no matter how much he hated his parents, there was always that part of him that would love them. They were his parents, people you were supposed to love and trust - something that Gerard missed from both of them. They were the ones who gave birth to him, and despite all the bad things that happened in Gerard’s life, there were still the good ones left to cherish. Donna and Donald were family, the ones who had given both he and his brother life.

Gerard wiped his eyes carefully and got up from the bed, slowly as not to faint again - he had learned that standing up quickly after lying down for a long time could make you faint. His head was spinning, but there was no loud noise in his ears nor sign of bad vision. The floor creaked as he took a step out on the wooden floor causing a mild pain in his head. The teen guessed loud sounds couldn’t have been the best thing for his head at the moment.

He made his way over to the bathroom - which was linked to the bedroom - and left the door open behind him. It wasn’t like he was gonna do some business anyways, and every Toro family member had promised to knock on his door if they ever wanted something - and they weren't even home at the instance. Ray’s brothers had been ordered to stay at their grandparents place, and been given an explanation as to why with Gerard’s permission. Apparently they accepted it and hoped for him to get better, but Gerard doubted that.

When he saw his reflection in the mirror, he was more or less horrified at the sight. His red hair was tousled around, looking messier than what it had done in years. His eyes were red rimmed, giving him the appearance of a raccoon but just a tad bit more terrifying. It almost looked as if he had turned older in the spawn of two days, as if he suddenly had turned thirty and had been working for hours on end. He didn’t dig the look in any way, and so he tried to freshen himself up by splashing some water in his face. It didn’t really help, but Gerard was too tired to actually try.

The minutes seemed to tick by as he stood in front of the mirror, inspecting and taking in what he had become. He was undoubtedly a mess, a fucking wreck. But, he was starting to get used to it, maybe not the best thing to get used to but better now than never. The shitty old Gerard was starting to shine through again, and the shitty new Gerard didn’t look forward to it.

“Gerard, it hurts,” Gerard immediately whipped around at the sudden voice in the room, and he almost let out a scream as he saw two kids by the bathtub. One of them was sitting on the edge of the tub, while the other was kneeling down in front of him, papers in his hands. The one on the floor was cleaning the other boy’s hands which seemed to be bleeding, and Gerard realized what the scene was depicting.

“It’s okay, it will eventually heal,” the one on the floor said, the one that Gerard recognized as himself as an eight year old.

“But what if it doesn’t?” The other boy asked, who Gerard recognized as a six year old Mikey. Tears began to form in the small boy’s eyes, and he started to cry quietly while young Gerard bitterly continued on cleaning the wounds on his brother’s hands. Their conversation flew out into haziness, and it soon became evident to Gerard that they weren’t real in any way.

It was the first memory that Gerard had of Mikey ever crying, and it broke him. The younger Way didn’t like to cry in front of people because according to him, it was showing your weaknesses. Gerard only saw it as a way of showing your emotions. Not that he liked to cry in front of people either, but he certainly didn’t feel like people would go and think he was weak if he cried. And if they did, it was their problem, not his.

“Mikey?” Gerard heard his own voice say, but one with a lot softer and younger tone to it. He walked into the bedroom again, and saw what he would guess to be twelve year old Mikey lying on the bed, book in his hands. He only hummed as an answer however, and a younger depiction of Gerard walked through the door.

Now he was sure he was on some acid trip.

“Or you okay, Gee?” Mikey asked and looked over at the then black haired teen. He sat up in his bed and motioned for young Gerard to sit down next to him, who didn’t move a muscle. Now time Gerard knew exactly what was going to happen, in every single detail. Every single second of the scene was almost programmed into his brain by now, as if playing it was the easiest thing ever.

“Uh, well there may be this one thing I need to tell you,” young Gerard mumbled as he started to play with the hem of his dirty shirt, something he used to do when he was younger. “I may or may not have been thinking a lot recently. These thought have been revolving a lot around love. I'm not in love so to say, but like there’s these things that I’ve been thinking about. Like I may be like what you would call… attracted to the same gender because I don’t really find girls that attractive. I’m gay, kinda. I think I am…”

The scene blurred out again, but Gerard already knew what was going to happen. Mikey wouldn’t answer, Gerard would start panicking and cry which in turn would make his brother cry as well. They would eventually talk it out, and only a few days after that he would come out to his parents. Everyone around him accepted it, Ray and Brendon obviously did as Brendon was the most stereotypical gay person Gerard knew - he wasn't even that stereotypical but then again Gerard didn’t know a lot of people - and Ray said he would be fine with dating whatever, as long as the person felt right to date.

It was the first time that Gerard finally felt at home, like he was fitting in somewhere. The feeling of comfort finally surrounded him, but it disappeared not too long after that as he began to argue with his parents only a few days later. He thought that maybe they would go easier on him if he would come out to them, and just maybe would they feel like he wasn’t all too bad. Since they knew that Brendon was gay he thought that they would accept him as well, which they did, but it still didn’t help their family situation. Looking back at it, now time Gerard didn’t understand 15 year old Gerard’s reasoning to being accepted.

After the two sudden scenes had played up in front of him, Gerard decided that maybe it wasn’t for the best that he stayed in Ray’s brother’s bedroom - which now was occupied by him. He left the room, the feeling of dread almost attacking him as he stepped out in the empty corridor. It was overwhelming for him, and he almost stumbled backwards into the room again as if someone actually had pushed him, but Gerard stood tall and walked down the corridor towards the stairs. On his way he passed by the room that Mikey had stayed in, and the redhead stopped by the door.

The room was cold. The bed was made, and the shirt that Mikey had borrowed from Ray was lying on the bed. It was as if no one had bothered to go inside and just left it as it was. The room wasn’t necessarily welcoming, but Gerard still felt as if someone was pulling him inside, forcing him to feel more pain than what he already had inflicted on himself.

It smelled like slight lavender and vanilla, two scents that usually followed Mikey like the plague. Not that either smell was a bad one, but whatever the fuck the teen did he always managed to smell like one or both of them. Gerard smelled like graphite and coffee, maybe not the most attractive smells to be combined, but he liked to see it as two things he loved combined into one. It showed what he liked, even if most people probably would say he smelled a bit funny. It could also be for the fact that he was too lazy to shower a lot of times and re-used clothes more often than never.

Gerard exited the bedroom and slowly trudged down the stairs. The emptiness and silence in the house felt haunting, as if someone had died there earlier. It was practically true, Gerard's life had shattered into pieces in the hall of the house, so something had died, just not in the way most people would think.

It was eerily silent in the house, except for the occasional sounds the fridge gave out. The sounds could best be described as something a chicken would give out. It was suddenly accompanied by the freezer making a sound to be compared with a rumbling stomach, and Gerard sighed as he started to feel comfortable. Silence wasn’t something he was used to, and he didn’t like it for that simple reason. Something would always have to go on in the house as it was like that at his own home.

“Shots, shots, shots!” Someone shouted, and Gerard quickly whipped his head over to the couch where he saw himself, Ray and Brendon. Gerard and Ray sat on the couch as they seemed to have some sort of shot contest, while Brendon was standing on the coffee table in front of them as he yelled the words as some sort of mantra. It was obvious that no one was home, because they always drank alcohol whenever their parents were away. It was a norm.

What now time Gerard would guess to be sixteen year old Gerard, took a shot and then cringed. Ray seemed to cringe at just seeing Gerard like that, but young him just continued on as Brendon was jumping around in ecstasy. He had probably drunk way too much, something he was keen to do even now.

But just like before, the scene vanished before it could escalate into anything. Gerard was starting to speculate that maybe he actually was on some sort of acid trip, and he decided to do something he usually never did. He grabbed his leather jacket which hung on a coat hanger and put on his shoes. He took one of the extra keys that the Toro family left for him and left the house.

The day was transitioning into evening, and the horizon was a mix of orange and pink. It was still warm in September, so the teen didn’t really have any worries for it turning cold quicker than he imagined. The exact scenario had happened to him before, so he had first hand experience with it. He couldn’t really say it was something to be recommended.

Gerard started walking. He didn’t know where to, but it was better than staying at the Toro residence for the moment. Maybe he could be a creep and creep around his own house, but as quick as the thought made its way into his head he realized it was an awful idea. Donna and Donald had a bad history with creepy people outside the house, and Gerard creeping around wouldn’t be much better. They would immediately recognize his fire truck red hair.

His feet carried him to - somewhere. Gerard’s mind was spinning, making him almost incapable of knowing what he actually was doing. His vision was blurry, but it wasn’t to the point where he would faint as there was no noise in his ears, nor the feeling of nausea. His mind was out on an entirely different walk, probably on its way to Australia or something. Australia would actually be a nice place to go on a vacation to, he realized, but maybe without the spiders and snakes. Not that he disliked them, but he didn’t feel like dying just yet.

The minutes that went must have been a lot more than what he originally thought, because all of a sudden Gerard was standing on a playground he had no idea existed. There was a set of swings, monkey bars and a sand pit which barely contained any sand any longer. The place almost looked rotten, abandoned of sort. Even the trees looked like they were dying, and Gerard realized that he finally had found his calling.

The teen sat down on one of the swings, careful as not to break it. The chains were rusty, and when he tried to swing on it they scrapped angrily against the metal bar holding them up. Gerard decided that maybe they weren’t suit to swing on, but nonetheless he swayed carefully back and forth. If they broke he could always try the other swing, but the plank you were supposed to sit on had been attacked by organisms, turning it rotten.

“Fuck, watch out!” A voice suddenly called out, and Gerard looked up right in time to get hit by a stick directly in the face. He immediately lost grip of the chains and tumbled backwards, hitting the dirt ground with a thud. A dog barked in the background, and in less than a second, a big, hairy thing was licking Gerard’s face. He didn't particularly hate it, unless it was some creature like the creature of the black lagoon which had attacked him and not a dog like he suspected.

“Get off him, King!” The same voice called out again and Gerard heard footsteps quickly making its way over to him. “Oh my fuck, don’t go attack people like that! I get it, I threw the damn stick at him but man. King, stop!” The man - or boy, it sounded like - clapped his hands, and the dog apparently named King stopped licking Gerard's face, which now was covered in saliva. Now it wasn’t as pleasant.

The boy pulled at King’s collar and forced him away from Gerard, but he froze as he saw the redhead lying on the ground. Gerard himself wiped at his face and sat up, only to come face to face with Frank - Frank I-fucking-ero. Frank Iero’s - supposed - dog had licked Gerard’s face. Not that it was to be celebrated because it literally meant nothing, but it felt as if his father just had accepted his request for marrying him.

“Oh, hey,” Frank choked out after the two had looked at each other a few seconds longer than necessary. “Sorry about that dude, that fall must have hurt.” He reached out with one of his hands to help Gerard, who gladly took it. He swung his legs away from the swing and got up, almost embarrassingly bumping into the shorter of the two.

“Thanks, and not really, I’ve been through a lot of accidents,” Gerard confessed and shrugged. “I must fall off Mount Everest for something to feel surprising by now.” The two boys laughed, but quickly fell into silence again. It was awkward and both could clearly feel it. Just like so many times before Gerard was stuck in a social altercation that began with something embarrassing. Usually it involved him accidentally dropping paint or something alike, but this time it involved sticks. And it wasn’t him who started the awkwardness - for once.

King didn’t seem to like it either as he barked loudly, scaring the two boys. “Oh right, shit.” Frank seemed to remind himself and he bowed down to pick the stick up, only to throw it in the opposite direction. King ran after it, barking loudly as he did.

“Nice dog you have,” Gerard tried, and Frank shone up as if he just had told him he had won a Nobel prize. “It’s a German Shepherd, if I’m not wrong? Hell for all I know that could be a damn golden retriever or even a chihuahua. I don’t think it’s a chihuahua though because I believe that’s a pretty small dog and that seems to be a big dog but I don’t know anything about dog breeds so that might not even be a dog it could be a fucking cat for all I know man I am embarrassing oh what a shame.” Frank was confused, it was obvious judging from his face expression. But it didn’t seem to matter as he started to laugh, shaking his head at Gerard’s despicable attempt at knowledge of dogs.

“It’s a pure German Shepherd, yes it is,” Frank said and smiled proudly. “He’s filled with energy, but he’s also very protective. He was actually the one who scared the robbers when they tried to rob us, thankfully. I don’t think I ever could scare them the fuck away with my damn powers. Oh and speaking of powers, I found my body energy!”

“Oh, that’s great, was it warm or cold?” Gerard had to ask, he had to know if they possibly could be together or not.

“It was ice cold, dude,” score. “But I managed through it. It actually came to me when I was in the car at the mall - I was too lazy to join my mom shopping I mean who the fuck would - and it just came over me as if someone had poured the Atlantic Ocean over me. Wow that was a shitty resemblance, but whatever. At the same time however, it was as if I was reading every single person’s mind in the whole parking lot. Voices were whispering in my head for a few seconds until all of them just vanished. It was creepy as hell, I’m telling you.”

“Well I believe Tyler told me that you kind of use one of the powers you haven’t been able to use before,” Gerard explained, and Frank raised on his eyebrows at the teen. “Like he said that if you haven’t “unlocked” or “discovered” your body energy there will be like a lock on your powers. It sounds utterly ridiculous, and I still haven’t had the time to look it up myself, but I trust the guy. He seems to have good control with his powers and all.”

Frank nodded at that, and he turned around to throw the stick away again as King had arrived back when Gerard was speaking. “Maybe, would be fucking badass to listen in on every thought out there in the world, like working as this network you know. But I don’t think I’ll ever be able to do such a thing, but a boy can always dream, can’t he?” He small lopsided smile was playing on Frank’s thin lips, and Gerard really had to concentrate on something else than the beauty in front of him. It was harder said than done though.

“I guess so…” Gerard mumbled. Frank seemed to pick up on something, and he furrowed his eyebrows as he squinted his eyes as to be able to see Gerard’s emotions and thoughts. The older didn’t notice this, and Frank gasped loudly and took a step backwards. Gerard looked up at him with a confused face, because if there was some scary monster behind him he was dead.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Frank mumbled as he put a hand over his mouth. “I didn’t know…”

“What? What the fuck are you talking about? You’re scaring me…” Gerard said and brushed a part of his red hair behind one of his ears. Frank’s mortified face turned pale, and he started to mumble profanities.

“Why the fuck must my powers be so shitty? Why is it that I must malfunction so much? Am I really this damn awful at hearing the difference between a real voice speaking and one inside someone’s mind? They fucking echo in your head dude, but at times they don’t fucking echo. Do you have an on-off button inside of you? You probably fucking do, you shitty little gnome. Man you fucking suck,” Frank rambled to himself, and Gerard would have laughed if it wasn’t for the seriousness of the situation. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to read your mind and I apologize. That was wrong of me and I just… no I don’t even know any longer.”

Gerard couldn’t get himself to say anything. It was as if his mouth had been sewed shut or he had been banned from speaking a single word. His body didn’t react to anything he wanted to do either, which could have been good because other wise he probably would have slapped Frank. It wasn’t his fault, no Gerard agreed on that, but he still couldn’t help but to feel angry at him. Frank didn’t have the same control over his powers like Gerard did, he was more leaning over to the side of Mikey’s control.

“What information did you gather from my thoughts? Memories? Brain?” Gerard asked ferociously, getting a little too into it for Frank’s liking.

“It was a little hazy and all but…” Frank trailed off as if he didn’t want to continue, but Gerard’s glare seemed to convince him. “I just had this really weird sight of like sitting by a table. There was a woman whom I’ve never seen before sitting in front of me, and next to her was a man. Suddenly the man slapped the boy next to me? Man, it all went by so quick I didn’t really have the time to comprehend it. Was that like a memory of some sort?” He asked the last part carefully, as to make sure the other older wouldn’t break.

Gerard sighed heavily and nodded. “Yeah, like from three days ago… The point of view you had was probably from me. I was sitting in front of my mother by the dinner table. My father was situated next to her and my brother sat next to me. My brother said something about Mutants that dad didn’t agree with and he slapped him,” Gerard looked up to see Frank’s face pulled into a frown, but he continued. “I screamed at how dumb they were, and then me and my brother kind of fled the house? Recently I got to know that I wasn’t allowed back home but… my brother was. That’s the reason why I’m here, I needed to clear my mind…”

He didn’t know why he was confessing this to Frank. Frank wasn’t really the most reliable person out there, being friends with the popular people and all. But somehow, there was this something about him that just made him reliable. It felt as if you could trust him, and Gerard knew that the teen hated humanity, so he would probably take his side of the whole argument. Then he was also Frank Iero, and Gerard totally didn’t have crush on him.

“Your parents sound pretty damn shitty, if I can say so,” Frank almost asked and he raised on his eyebrows in a sort of questioning manner. “I’ve said it before and I'll say it again, I hate people. Your parents are just a prime example of why I hate humanity, it’s so fucking dumb. Like not to shit on them or some shit but holy hell. I feel sorry for you, both of you. Your brother is the tall blondie, right?” Gerard nodded. “Man, that your dad dares to speak against that. I mean your brother looks frightening. Then again your dad could be scarier and I am getting off track yet again fuck.”

“It’s okay,” Gerard giggled, making Frank smile slightly. “I need my mind to think of something other than my family, got any ideas?”

“I’ve got a lot of ideas,” Frank winked at that, but just as he did he seemed to understand the sexual undertone and his face fell. “Not in that way though, I promise. No homo. Not that I have anything against gay people I promise- I’ve already told you that. Shit I suck at human conversation, this is why I love dogs. Dogs are amazing, don’t you just agree?”

Gerard could barely keep up with Frank’s sudden change in conversations. Sure, he knew himself that he rambled on a lot, and could at times just forget the topic of the conversation but Frank was just ridiculous. He literally went from complaining on humanity to dogs in under a minute, he was truly amazing at being awful at human interaction. But like he said he liked dogs, which was something Gerard didn’t know. Then again he didn’t know that much about Frank.

“Well I guess so,” he managed to mumble. “I mean I’m not the biggest animal friend out there, but I know a few things about dogs? Actually no I don’t know anything about dogs I am literally just trying to be cool right now. Are dogs cool? I mean chicks seem to like guys with dogs, not that I’m interested in girls though so it doesn’t really matter for me but for you, maybe it does to you.”

“I hate people, girls included,” Frank deadpanned and Gerard smiled at that. “I broke up with my girlfriend for the fifth time or some shit, so she hasn’t really done a great impact on my relationship history. I was even considering dating a guy because Pete have said that it’s easier than dating a girl, apparently they crave too much, which I agree on. Then again he said that guys always want to have sex, but since we’re talking about Pete I don’t think he wanted me to take it in a bad way - which I did. Dating is just time craving.

Also on the whole dog thing, girls usually say “oh that’s so cute that your dog is protecting you” just because I’m short. Other times they’ll stare with a frightened face expression because I look scary or some shit. If you give off bad vibes, King will kinda growl at you. You didn’t seem to give off any bad vibes however, even if you were moping on a swing.”

“Wow, thanks dude,” Gerard said sarcastically and the two laughed, albeit a small one. “Dating is overrated; says the guy who’s never dated anyone. My brother used to date this chick in 9th grade, but apparently she was too craving so he broke it off… So I can kinda say that’s where my dating experience lies, me and Mikey can be glued by the hip at times…” Frank was giving him a look of sympathy, one he didn’t want to accept. Sure, Gerard may have it hard, but he didn’t want to make everything about himself. He hated having all the attention on him when it came to his problems.

“You should give yourself some love too,” Frank said quietly, their eyes meeting as if they were in some sappy romance book. “You need to think about yourself sometimes, because if you only have time to think of others, your love for them will eventually mean nothing. It sounds kinda stupid, I know, but that’s what my mom has told me. There’s no need to love others if you can’t love yourself, the first step to acceptance is always loving yourself, very simple. Or well it’s simple to say, but harder to do. Like I don’t accept myself, but I’m fine with being me. You just gotta let go at times, Gerard, and nothing I just said made sense.”

It didn’t make sense, Gerard agreed on that but he still understood what the teen meant. He shouldn’t try and worry about everyone else, caring too much about them until it just pained him. Sure that he was supposed to love them, but he had a tendency to show his love and admiration too much. At certain times he could stress himself out, and Gerard was starting to feel stressed again. The peer pressure of just thinking of his family could wear him out - he was emotionally drained.

“I- uhm,” Gerard blurted out as a way of trying to break the agonizing silence between them, he wasn’t succeeding. “Thanks, Frank. I honestly didn’t think you had something like that inside of you. It was nice of you to show some care for me, even if we barely know each other at all…”

“Nah, it’s fine, dude,” Frank said and smiled brightly, almost too brightly. “I’m always up for giving some shitty advice to someone and accidentally making their life more miserable than what it was before!” The sarcasm was clear in his voice, but Gerard couldn’t help but to feel that there was some truth behind it. It wouldn’t surprise him really as Frank was quite the special guy.

As the two fell into another silence, both of them slowly realized that King still hadn’t returned after getting the stick. Frank immediately started to call after the dog, and Gerard joined in on it. He didn’t really worry because maybe King was just doing “dog things” and running around wherever the fuck they were. Now that he came to think of it; where the fuck was he anyways? Frank seemed to know the area at least, or hopefully because otherwise that dog was good as dead and so was Gerard.

“I can’t find him, fuck. King! Please, show yourself!” The shorter of the two was now to the verge of desperation, as he was pulling at his jet black hair. It was a mess, and Frank looked more distressed than what Gerard had ever seen, but it wasn’t like the redhead saw much of him anyways so there wasn’t anything to really compare with. Except for his usual bored face, where he looked done with everyone and everything.

The two teens continued on their search for the dog, and after about ten minutes of intense searching, Frank stopped. He just stood right upside down in the middle of the sidewalk, but his glare was intense as well was his body language. He didn’t look calm for one single bit, even if that’s the vibe he was managing to give off.

Then he moved again, but stopped as he came to an alleyway. “There, there they are. Those sick fucks,” Frank mumbled, and Gerard hurried to his side. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing!” He yelled angrily, and stomped into the alleyway. That’s when Gerard noticed that there was a bunch of people there, holding what appeared to be a dog by its collar. Gerard followed suit, but he was starting to feel uncertainty over the whole situation. Obviously Frank couldn't think straight when he had to save his dog - who seemed to be quite the important thing in his life - but Gerard wasn’t planning on getting beaten up.

The men - or women, but they looked like men - let go off King, and the German Shepherd immediately made his way over to Frank, who only walked past him. The dog made his way over to Gerard instead, while Frank just continued forward. His hands were balled into fists, and his face was distorted into something you could call monsterous rage. No wonder really, he was a dog lover and they seemingly just hurt his dog. You could basically say the situation reversed; as usually it was the dog that protected their owner.

“What the fuck, do you think you were doing?” Frank growled, but the group didn’t answer, nor did they move. “When I ask you a question I want you to fucking answer, don’t you understand such simple ass language? What the fuck do you think you were doing to my dog, you fucking dimwits? Fucking answer!” He was fuming with anger, almost jumping on the place. His face was up in one of the others’, but yet no one moved. It was as if they weren’t actually there.

“Frank, isn’t it better if we just leave?” Gerard asked carefully as he reached down to pat King, who had began to stroke himself against his leg. “Starting a fight is not something to be recommended…” Frank seemed to hesitate for a second, before he snarled at the man in front of him.

“You better not touch my fucking dog again, shitface,” Frank growled and spat at the ground in front of the man, then turned around to walk over to Gerard and King. The men behind him seemed to loosen up, and the one whom he had been staring dead in the eye popped a few bones in his body. It made Gerard cringe - he didn’t like when people cracked their knuckles - while Frank acted on animal instinct and quickly whipped around. King was by his side in the matter of a second, showing his sharp teeth at the men, a low growl leaving his throat.

“Calm down, kid,” the man said, his voice gruff and rough, almost as if he hadn’t spoken in years. “I won’t harm you nor your dog. I just wanted to compliment both of you for being so strong, it’s amazing honestly. I guess there will be competition after all, that is if you can protect your loved ones. See you guys later, thanks for your patience.” The man saluted them and turned down the alleyway, the others following him.

Neither Gerard or Frank could move in their states, and they just watched as the group seemingly disappeared. Okay well they just turned around the corner that was at the end of the alleyway, but it was as if they just disappeared for the two boys. After the men were gone, Frank was the first to speak; “What the fuck was that. I was sure he was fucking dead or some shit. Compliment us for being strong? What the hell is that supposed to mean? Do you think he… knows?”

“About our powers?” Gerard asked quietly, and Frank nodded slowly. “It seems like it, other wise I have no idea what strength he would be talking about. Like you were only shouting in his face and I was just standing here as if time had frozen me, there’s literally nothing that says strength about us. What did he want anyways? His face was sort of hidden behind the damn hoodie he was wearing, sadly.”

“It feels as if I’ve come right out from some awful story that needs to hide things, man this sucks,” Frank complained and kicked the ground with his foot, managing to kick a pebble into one of the walls. “At least I’m glad that King’s safe, and that’s currently all that matters.” He bent down to pat his dog on the head, and Gerard smiled at the scene. Frank seemed to be genuinely happy with his dog, as if he was the only one who understood him in the world.

“Well erm I should be getting home now, or home and home, yeah,” Gerard mumbled awkwardly as he watched Frank petting his dog. “The thing is I have no idea where the fuck I am, do you?”

Frank looked up at him with a questioning face, but then burst into a big grin. It was quite cute, Gerard realized. “Of course I know where we are, I live just a few minutes away from here, and me and Pete go here regularly. I know this place like the back of my hand! Okay actually no but you get what I mean. I’ll take you to Lane Park, if you now can find back to your- whatever’s house.”

“I believe I can find back home from there, I’ve been there a couple of times so it shouldn’t be too hard.”

The two started to walk towards what Gerard partly hoped was Lane Park and partly hoped was Frank’s house. When they passed by a small house and Frank pointed it out as his, his dreams were crushed. Okay well they were never really dreams and they weren’t that important, but he was disappointed to realize that he would never be able to just accidentally walk past here again. It’s not like he would forget Frank’s address anyways, that boy was too important for him.

They passed by Pete’s house - they managed to see the teen sitting in the kitchen, but decided not to bother him - as well as Bob’s - everything was dark and it creeped them both out so they hurried by. The two of them were soon by Lane Park, and by now it had turned considerably darker than what it was when Gerard left.

They said their goodbyes, King managing to get a last sniff on Gerard before he and Frank left for the other direction. Gerard watched as Frank stuck his hands down his hoodie’s pockets, and he and King started to play a little as they made their way home - or somewhere else. The redhead left the scene and walked - what currently was known to be - home, or to the Toro residence. It didn’t take too long until he recognized the streets he was walking on, relief washing over him. He didn’t actually know which way he was supposed to go, and just went with the feeling in his gut.

Gerard walked by house after house, passing by his own home in the meantime. The TV in the living-room was on, but it was pretty dark in the rest of the house - except for in the garage. The garage door was open in the slightest, but open nonetheless. Gerard being Gerard thought that it was an awesome idea just to creep a little, because he was self-certified creepy.

The teen quickly hurried over the lawn, just to make sure his parents didn’t notice him. He laid down on his stomach and looked under the garage door, only managing to see a few boxes. But midst the boxes he saw a pair of beat-up converse - a pair he recognized badly.

“Hey, psst!” Gerard whispered a she stretched out an arm under the garage door. The converse moved in the slightest, and someone seemed to try and choke down a shriek as they let out gurgling sound combined with a scream. “Open up, it’s me, Gerard!” It probably didn’t look that professional that someone was lying by the garage door of a house, and especially not in a way that looked like they were trying to break in.

“What the fuck, Gee?” Mikey’s voice said from the other side, and Gerard slapped his hand against the concrete a little too hard.

“Sorry, just open up, I look like a damn burglar,” the older commented, and he heard his brother giggle from the other side of the garage door. The redhead got up from the ground and brushed off the dust from his clothes as he watched the garage door open up slowly. It was one of those automatic ones that you couldn’t open up with force. It was both smart and dumb, just like Gerard himself. He never thought he would compare himself with a garage door.

Gerard’s face shone up as his brother got into view, and he almost threw himself onto Mikey as fast as he could get into the garage. He wrapped his arms around his brother’s neck, almost crushing him in the process. Mikey didn’t hug back however, but tried his best at pushing Gerard off of him.

It clearly left the older confused as he pulled away, eyes already forming with tears. “You- you don't want a… a hug?” Gerard’s voice broke, just like his heart at the exact instant.

“I- we’re not allowed to meet any longer, you know that,” Mikey whispered and ran a hand through his messy hair. A habit, Gerard realized. “Mom and dad- they don’t… We just can’t, okay? If they ever found out that you were here they would decapitate me and probably stone you to death. I don’t want you to get hurt, and I believe this is the best way. Like I love you and all but we just can’t, okay?” Unlike Gerard’s, Mikey’s voice was stable. His eyes were burning themselves into Gerard’s, and it was almost too painful for them to look at each other.

Gerard didn’t answer however. He just stood there with his arms awkwardly swinging by his sides, almost as if he didn’t know whether he should reach out to correct Mikey’s necklace or slap him. The rejection from his brother was on the level of his imagination of getting rejected by Frank - which was painful to even image because there was no way in hell that he would ever dare to ask Frank out. His thoughts about Frank was to be put on a shelf however, the short boy had already occupied his mind enough for one day.

“You know what, Mikey,” Gerard said, voice steady and eyes strained on his brother. “There are certain risks I have to take everyday. One of those risks are getting out of bed. When I lived here I could risk getting beaten to death everyday, you know that? I’ve been dreading to face Donna and Donald every single day for my whole life, and you? You got off easy. Around me, people asked how the fuck I could love you as much as I did, and I always answered the same. Because you are my brother, someone whom I would risk my life for. But now, I don’t know any longer. You’ll always be my little brother, the little brother that I love, but if someone asked me why I love you so much as I do - I would say I don’t know. I truly don’t know.”

Now it was Mikey’s turn to be silent. His eyes flickered from left to right, not settling down on anything in particular. Just like Gerard before, he didn’t know whether to walk away or say something. Maybe his mind wasn’t stuck on Frank Iero like Gerard’s was, but maybe instead of Pete. The thought of Pete disgusted Gerard, and all of a sudden anger washed over him. It was as if someone had pressed a button and his mood changed from empty to anger in the matter of a second.

“Will you just fucking say something?” Gerard bit at Mikey, who flinched at the loud and piercing voice. “Is it really that fucking hard? Don’t you understand basic human communication? It’s just to open your mouth and try to form a word. Like “fuck” or “go die”, even if “go die” are two words. I thought you were supposed to be an A straight student, how the fuck does it come that you just can’t say fucking something?!”

“Because I just can’t think, okay?” Mikey yelled, not quite reaching to Gerard’s volume, but louder than what he used to talk with. “You of all people should understand, shouldn’t you? It’s hard for me too, life isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. Honestly, it can be hard for me to get out of bed at times as well. Ever since you started high school I’ve had to get up at six in the morning just because I had to help mom, dad and you. I’m the one who prepared everything and pulled you out of bed - quite literally at times. But when I do every single thing like clean the whole house, go and buy groceries or prepare the food, I never get a simple “thank you”. Sure, I may get praised and noticed by mom and dad whenever I manage to get an A on a test or whatever, but other wise - just like you - I am pretty much no one. You’re not the only one with problems, Gerard.”

Of course, he knew that Mikey had his problems as well, but something in Gerard kept repeating itself. “You should give yourself some love too”. Those words Frank had told him earlier, those were the words he was trying to tell himself. He couldn’t say that it was working as now he was starting to feel sympathy for his brother, putting his own emotions on a shelf to worry about later. Mikey was and will always be more important, no matter what. Even if the younger Way suddenly decided that he would turn into a punker, be a huge asshole and turn out to be a fuckboy - Gerard would still care for him as if he was ten years old.

“Michael,” Gerard whispered, the name almost dancing on the tip of his tongue. “There’s three simple words I want you to remember, forever. I love you.” At that, he turned around and walked out of the garage. His feet - just like before - were moving on their own. The mind of Gerard Way was out there in the open, swaying around, not really sure whether it should return back to Gerard and help with his senses or just fly away into oblivion. It seemed to choose the latter, as the teen’s feet carried him away. He did recognize Mikey’s voice - somewhere - but his mind couldn’t wrap around the words.

The pavement in front of him turned into a blur, and Gerard’s will to walk was starting to fade. But nonetheless he kept on walking, even if every step he took hurt. As his shoe clad feet hit the ground the impact sent both a physical and mental pain soaring throughout his body. The ground below him seemed to shift, and he had to stop for a second to regain his sight. Thoughts was something Gerard wasn’t good at sorting.

The walk home - to the Toro residence - seemed to dread on for longer than what it usually did. Minutes almost felt like hours, and each and every step weighted the more and more on him. Dread was following him like a bad smell and guilt started to weigh down on his shoulders, it was as if the world finally wanted to punish him for the sins he committed everyday. Life for the teen was getting worse by the second and soon enough he was to burst for real.

He finally arrived back, almost missing the house as he just kept on mindlessly wandering. The driveway was still empty - much to Gerard’s surprise. He actually believed that the Toro family would be back by now, but he did have a lot of experience with their shopping as well. They were undeniably the worst people to go with if you wanted something from a store, because they just had to look at every single item in the damn store. Seriously, you could end up being stuck in the store for about an hour until they felt like it was appropriate to leave.

After locking the door behind him, taking off his shoes and hanging up his jacket on a coat hanger, Gerard trudged back upstairs. By now he was barely functioning as his mind had shut itself off. He was working on auto-pilot, his body finally ending up in the bedroom he currently owned. He closed the door after him and fell down onto the bed. It was painful to feel the sheets against his body, painful enough that he decided to throw them onto the floor.

Gerard’s life wasn’t whole any more, it was just random pieces that had been scattered around the universe. It had been hard on him before, but he knew that at least Mikey would always have his back, no matter what. Now however, he just felt alone. Life was starting to pale in front of his eyes, losing its spark that it used to have. There was no longer a purpose for him to serve the Earth, he had done what he was supposed to do - nothing.

Of course, he had given light to his friends, but as he lost his own light there was no way that he ever would be able to share it with others. He always cared for the others around him, never giving himself enough of the love he shared. Frank had been absolutely right; you can’t share all your love with others unless you share some with yourself. Apparently he knew more than what Gerard would have guessed, he only saw the words he was told as some sort of sympathy.

He lied still in bed, letting it consume him. Gerard was tired, even if he probably had slept more in two days than what he had done in two weeks. He wasn’t really physically tired so to say, but more mentally. His head had been spinning around way too much in one week and it was starting to show on him. There wasn’t really any pressure on him that he should get better with his Mutant powers, because he was already one of the best - at least according to himself after having inspected Martha.

But even if he could control his powers without too much trouble, his emotions were something entirely different. Despite his best attempt at not - for the bazillionth time - crying he let a tear slip. It slowly made its way down his dirty cheek, finally landing on the pillow. One after another came the tears, and Gerard didn’t even try holding them back. He was too beat up, there was no will in him left.

He had finally burst.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> nEXT CHAPTER WILL THINGS... HAPPEN.


	8. The Existential Crisis Of Frank Iero And His (Man) Crush

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I sat up until 4 am last night and wrote this be happy

When Frank arrived back at home it was silent in the house. It didn’t really surprise him, his mother worked long days to be able to provide them food and a roof over their heads. The silence in the house was cut short however when his smaller dog, Sweet Pea, barked loudly. She came running down the stairs towards the teen, and Frank smiled as the little dog wagged her tail around. Dogs always cheered him up, as long as they didn’t bite him or something, that is.

“Hey, you got any food? I’ll make sure to give some to you, come on,” Frank said in a soft baby voice - he only did this when he was alone however. He took off his shoes and went into the kitchen. As usual, his mother had put the dog food on the highest shelf which was something he never understood. Both of them had to stand on their tiptoes to reach to the shelf, so why the hell would she place it there? Frank remembered her saying something about how the dogs could somehow reach it if it wasn’t up on the highest shelf, but he only found that to be utterly ridiculous.

After filling the dogs’ bowls with food and changing the old water to new freshwater, Frank made his way up to his room. He didn’t bother to close the door behind him as his mother wasn’t home, and both Sweet Pea and King sometimes liked to trudge in and out of his room as a way of saying; “come play with me you lazy-ass teenager”. The majority of the time it didn’t work because as stated, Frank was a lazy-ass teenager. Other times he would feel sympathy for his dogs and actually get up from his bed, only to sit down on the floor because there was no way in hell that he would go downstairs to play with them.

Frank lied down in his bed and groaned loudly. His thoughts immediately turned to Gerard, something that he didn’t understand. Sure he had spoken to the redhead about ten minutes before but for some reason he didn’t want to leave the younger’s mind. Gerard was apparently a lot cooler than what he let on, even if he was remarkably awkward and barely knew what he was saying himself, he was quite the cool guy. But since Frank wasn’t that skilled when it came to socializing either it didn’t really matter that much.

Compared to Pete who was loud, eccentric and way too social, Gerard was calmer, more reserved and seemed to hate humanity on the same level as Frank - perhaps slightly less. The fact that they seemed to have the same distaste for humans made Frank warm inside - for some reason -, he had never really cared for humans other than his parents, his grandpa and Pete. Just like dogs could be people dogs or not, he was not a people human. Frank was at the same time realizing that he was more and more like a dog than what he first had believed, and maybe it wouldn’t be too bad being a dog after all.

Gerard wasn’t however as awkward as Frank himself, but looked pretty damn cute. He had an adorable button up nose, and when he scrunched it up earlier because he had seen another human, Frank couldn’t help but to smile. The light brown in his eyes seemed to light up whenever Frank would talk to him, and his thin lips would curl up into the faintest smile. The thoughts of the older made Frank blush, and he tossed around in his bed as a low groan left his throat.

Thinking that boys were cute wasn’t something he did a lot, actually not at all, but there was just this captivating thing about Gerard. He stood out with his vibrant red hair and the whole him just screamed out awkwardness. For some dumb reason Frank liked that, it made him seem more real and less fake than those people he would usually surround himself with. Human wasn’t the first thing that would come to your mind about Gerard, he was more likely to be an alien than a human, Frank realized.

“No, fuck this,” Frank grumbled and fished his phone out of his pocket. He opened up his phone and went into contacts, calling the one person who thought would listen on his disgusting rants about sudden cute boys he’d never paid attention to before.

He impatiently tapped his fingers against his thigh, and as a slurred ‘hello’ came from the other side he didn’t waste a second to speak. “Okay sorry for calling you- actually no I’m not fuck you. I am currently having an existential crisis and I am in need of desperate help. There’s this boy who you know as the weird guy with the red hair also known as Gerard and I met this guy not too long ago like a few minutes ago and we had this very awkward encounter but we spoke to each other anyways and he appeared to be very cool like cooler than most people I know because he was very awkward and I was awkward as well but he was like super cute at the same time and I have no idea what to do now because I believe I may be developing this small tiny crush on the guy and he’s like gay and all so I do have a chance but I’m not gay so this whole scenario doesn’t make any fucking sense what the fuck do I do help.” He was well out of breath at the end of the sentence, but he was in desperate need to get the whole thing off of his chest in one go. He was too afraid that he would turn quiet and retreat into comfort where he never ever would think about Gerard again.

Frank was however met with silence on the other end of the line, and he started to dig his nails into his palm as a way of trying to calm himself down. “Okay well… that’s great.”

“Great? Pete, you fucking moron, this isn’t fucking great. I am literally dying over here what the fuck do you think and you believe this is great you fucking dickweed what the fuck.” He was stressing out way too much to even care what left his mouth at this point, even if what he said sounded very strange, but somehow typical him.

“Well excuse me, loverboy,” Pete sighed and Frank heard him move, something that for some reason sent him on the edge. “Just to put this short; you are basically developing this crush on Gerard whatever-the-fuck-his-last-name-is, oh wait who am I kidding he shares his last name with Mikey haha I am dumb- sorry. You are scared of having a crush on this guy, and so you turn to your friend who can’t for his whole life keep up a working relationship?”

“You are bi, you have experience with guys, you flirt with guys and have sex with them, you know this shit,” Frank deadpanned. He flipped his fringe out of his eyes, something which usually didn’t bother him but for some reason felt like needles to his face now. Maybe it was because his usual pale face looked more like a tomato’s by now.

“Okay well thank you I am honored,” Pete yawned. “Isn’t this the same as having a crush on anyone else? Like I’ve had crushes on both guys and girls since I was a little toddler or some bullshit, that’s what mom has told me. I was a hardcore kid.” He laughed dryly at the other end of the line, and Frank rolled his eyes at the unnecessary facts. He already knew about it anyways, Pete’s mom was very proud of his status in school.

“I’ve never had a real crush on someone, I’ve just dated them because they liked me and I felt bad for the first person I rejected. I am not an experienced dater in any sort of way despite having a lot of relationships. The thing is; he’s a guy. I just feel this stupid little flutter inside of me and I have no idea if it means that I have some sort of tumor, if I’m hungry or if I like the guy. I’ve always heard about how you got butterflies whenever you saw your crush or some cliché bullshit like that, I never believed in it though but now I kinda feel it so what should I do?” Frank was now on the verge of desperation as he waited in anticipation for Pete’s answer. He didn’t go to his best friend for advice that often (the guy had once set his finished homework on fire because “I wanted to see what would happen”). Pete was keen to do dumb things himself.

“Sorry I just thought of this great joke; the Way’s totally have a way of charming others,” Pete being Pete thought his own joke was hilarious, while Frank was not even mildly interested and just sat there with a poker face so done it could be compared to Mikey’s. “Haha, sorry dude, ooh. Oh well erm, I guess you like the guy? When you described him to me it seemed as if you did, and your feelings for him sound like it as well. Like I’ve never gotten this butterfly feeling before but I think people are hot, get me?”

“Yeah, but,” Frank whined, feelings was never his thing really. “I just dunno, man. I am confused and bothered by this- this feeling. Love is fucking shit, can movies stop teaching people about the wonders of love and instead focus on the more negative side of it? Like love isn’t all happiness in this hell of a world, it’s pretty much the opposite. You can’t do love, I can’t do love. What did we do to this world to deserve this complex love?”

Maybe Frank had been a little overdramatic but he wasn’t necessarily known as the guy who wouldn’t start a ruckus. He may stick under the radar when he’s with his group of 'friends' but in class he would sometimes comment about how something was stupid - he liked to do that - and the teacher would the majority of times send him out of the classroom. He wasn’t known as the badass punk rocker for nothing, even if the depiction people had of him was totally wrong.

“I am happy getting the sex I get,” Pete said, sounding a little too cocky for his own good. Pete did have ego issues though, that was true. “But I understand what ya mean, love was not destined for either of us. Does that mean that the two of us shall be together? Like I’m not interested in you or some bullshit but ya know.”

“Uh, just no,” Frank said with a low growl prominent in his voice. “You’re like my brother, no way that I would ever date you. No way… Ha! It’s like we would do some fucking Waycest, which is incest with the Way brothers, get it?”

Pete gasped on the other side of the line and a wheeze left his mouth. “That is amazing! Oh my Venus that was an excellent joke, I should totally tell that to Mikey when I meet him the next time. Actually no, Pete that is an awful idea, you will never be able to get into his pants if you tell him that joke. Maybe I could cover it up with a joke about 9/11…”

“Pete, don’t joke about that, maybe it will hurt him.” Frank mumbled and frowned.

“Dude shut up, you joke about such things all the time,” Pete snorted. “Also by the fucking way - pun intended - he said I should shove a missile up my ass when I said I liked his boots. What I meant by that was that I actually did like his boots, they look good on him. But when something like that comes out of my mouth it probably sounds weirder and much more inappropriate than what it’s actually supposed to be. Do you ever think I’ll be able to say something nice to someone without them taking it the wrong way?"

“Nope,” Frank said lightly, making his friend sigh. “But whatever that’s not what we are supposed to talk about. I was trying to get some goddamn guidance with my man crush on the guy you are flirting with’s brother. Come to think of it we took a liking to the same family what are the odds and the fact that they are two guys and not a girl and a guy or two girls is very disturbing to me what is happening Pete I’m scared this in unknown territory.”

“Wait, you’re scared?” Pete asked dumbfoundedly, and Frank nodded even if his friend couldn't see him. He seemed to understand that he nodded however, because he continued on talking. “Dude it’s nothing wrong with liking a guy. Personally I’ve known that for the longest time ever but I guess it’s something new to you. Just so you know, your friends won’t hate you as they are totally a-ok with me being bi and all. Your mom is chill about it as well, you know how much she loves to gossip about my relationships. Apparently I am very interesting to your mother.”

“Well my mom loves you lots, even more than me it seems like.” Frank mumbled. It was kind of true though, Linda had always liked Pete, ever since they were young boys. Frank and Pete had been close after the very first time they had interacted, and when Pete first met Frank’s parents he had made an amazing first impression by accidentally spilling his glass of juice onto the floor. After that when the two boys were up playing in Frank’s room he ripped off one of the younger’s action figure’s heads, accidentally of course. As icing on the cake he tumbled down the last set of stairs, broke his nose and bled on the carpet. They still had the same carpet by the stairs, and you could still see the blood splotch from years ago.

Despite all the bad first impressions he made - at least according to Frank - his mother and father seemed to like the boy. Probably because he could smile through a broken nose at the age of seven, but also because he kept apologizing refusely for the day’s events. Most parents would probably have said to never invite the boy again, but Frank’s parents did the exact opposite to that. Now on older days he had started to speculate that it was because he didn’t have any friends at the time and Pete’s natural charm came hand in hand with just that. Pete was probably not the first option of friend they went for, but it was better than Frank being alone.

“How was it when you came out to your parents? I mean like I don’t think I’m gay or some shit, this is more just like a one time crush and that’s that, y’know,” Frank tried, but Pete clicked his tongue. It was a painfully obvious lie, and Frank trying to lie to his best friend was like the chances of him getting to Pluto in under a second - downright impossible.

“Whatever you feel the most comfortable with, don’t be denial for too long however,” Pete warned him with a serious tone prominent in his voice. When Pete had a serious voice, he was serious, and Pete was never serious. “Okay but my coming out story is quite the… special one. You know how I’ve said that they just kinda knew it? Well that’s a complete lie, because when I was thirteen I was also a hardcore kid. I met this guy, William I think his name was, he said he was a year older but it was obvious he was like three years older, which I actually got to know afterwards. But we kinda had this thing going on, man I don’t know he was like a creep, and he was at my place this one time. And he went all like; “eh you wanna do something fun?” and of course me being me I rolled with it, and somehow it ended up with my tongue down his throat. As I was a horny kid and still am we were quickly starting to undress each other when my mom barged into my room all of a sudden and was like “food!” and luckily we only had our shirts off but we were still making out. To keep it short she kicked him out of the house, or well actually he kinda jumped out of my window it was fun to watch actually, but mom was quite disappointed in me. She took me and dad into the kitchen and was like “Pete why didn’t you tell us earlier” but they accepted it, just not the way I wanted to show them. Mom cried a little, not because she was sad but because she was proud of me in a way. Dad said that I could bring home any boy I liked, just not “that guy”. They understood that I was bi after my multiple relationships however, but they thought that was chill as well.”

Frank had actually never heard Pete’s coming out story, but he knew that it wasn’t going to be something like “I like guys”, because something normal like that was never going to happen in Pete’s life. But compared to Pete’s parents, Frank’s mom could be narrow minded at times. She could react entirely different when it came to her own son, since it was her own son, not her son’s friend. But she had never outspokenly said she didn’t support gay rights nor support it, so hopefully she would accept his man crush.

“I’ll just think over it for a while,” Frank sighed and ran a hand through his greasy hair. “Mom doesn’t need to know anything now, does she? It’s not like this is a real crush anyways, it’ll disappear in a few days or so. Right?”

“Yeah yeah whatever you say, Frankie,” Pete brushed it off with a snort.

They continued to talk for a few more hours. Frank was trying his best at not bursting out about how cute Gerard was and cry a little over it, but he composed himself and talked about how cute dogs were instead. Pete didn’t seemed to be too interested in the subject - dogs wasn’t something he was interested in for some reason - and instead started talking about cute boys, or more specifically Mikey Way. Frank also got to know that boys who have older brothers are more likely to be gay, which Pete was very thrilled to tell him about. It wasn’t something that affected Frank because his (man) crush was openly gay and an older brother, but Pete seemed to be happy. Frank had already speculated that Mikey wasn’t the straightest boy in town however, other wise he would never have accepted Pete’s lame flirting.

At around nine o’clock he went downstairs to get something to eat. His mother was sitting in the living-room, watching some deadbeat show on the TV. She was about to say something to him when she noticed that he was talking to someone on this phone, and she turned back to the TV. As Frank passed the living-room he heard his mother say something, and he put Pete on hold as he asked to repeat herself.

“I didn’t say anything, honey.” Linda said, her eyes not leaving the TV.

“Mom, I’m a hundred percent sure you said something, just because I’m talking to someone doesn’t it mean that you can’t talk to me - also it’s Pete,” Frank said and heard his friend shouting at him from his phone. “You said something about how I talk too loud, I heard it. Mom I’m not going to be offended if you-”

“I only thought that, Frank,” she said bitterly. She tightened her grip on the TV remote, her knuckles turning white. “I’ve heard a few things from the neighborhood ladies, and it’s worrying me. All of them say that at some point they have heard your voice clearly in their head, despite you not moving your lips. We did some research on whatever they could be hearing in their heads because at first we thought it was some sort of schizophrenia, but they had no symptoms of it other than your voice. Then maybe it was some sort of epidemic, but there was no record of this ever happening. But then we found this very shady looking website, there was this thing called “telepathy”. The things it said about it fit right into their descriptions,” she turned to look her son dead in the eye. “Frank, are you a Mutant?”

Simple words. The simple words were the ones that always scared him. It didn’t have to be too many, or sound complicated, but they could weigh so heavy on your shoulders. He’d never wanted to be asked that specific question by his mother however, out of all people his mother was someone who never was allowed to know. She would instantly disown him, that much was clear to him. Sure, she had never been outspokenly anti-Mutants, but judging from her current mood Frank was in hot water.

He sighed heavily and took a deep breath, exhaling it slowly. “Mother,” he gulped, looking down at the floor. He couldn’t look at her. “I am,” he clenched his fists, pushing away the gnawing feeling inside of him. “A hundred percent… A Mutant.”

Linda showed close to no emotion on her face. Obviously she knew that Frank was a Mutant, judging from how he reacted to her sudden topic and question. “Okay. Well, I guess what the ladies said are true, you really are what you listen to.” Frank’s head whipped up and he glared at his mother.

“Mom, I’m a Mutant, not a criminal,” he growled lowly. “If you’re not going to accept me, to hell with you. I’m a Mutant and I’ll proudly even write it on my own fucking skin. I do know telepathy, yes, and I have been telling those “neighborhood ladies” that they are indeed bitches. You know those fucking burglars? Yeah, I tried to scare them away by transmitting my thoughts over to them and it fucking worked. What they have been saying is true, and I don’t fucking care what you think of it because I am going to be proud of who and what I am.”

At that he stomped away into the hallway, his feet feet hitting the ground extra hard. “Pete?” He asked as he brung his phone to his ear. “I’m coming over.”

“‘Kay, see you in a while, we’ll talk about it,” Pete ended the call and Frank put his phone back into his back pocket. He heard how his mother was calling out for him, but he quickly stuck his feet into his combat boots. Linda grabbed ahold of his shoulder and spun him around before he got out. Her lips were moving, but Frank couldn’t hear a word what she said.

“Fuck off.” Frank muttered and ripped himself out of his mother’s grip. Hurt flashed in her eyes, but as quickly as it had appeared it was gone. She had no time to yell at him however as he was quick to open the door and dash out. He could hear how his mother yelled at him but he kept on running, not daring to face her with whatever expression her face wielded. He didn’t want to face disappointment, anger, sadness - anything really.

Frank almost fell face first into the pavement as he walked, legs wobbly and weak. Tears were stinging at his eyes, something he wasn’t used to in the least. He absolutely hated feeling weak, feeling as if he was just another individual in the universe, as if no one would understand or feel for him. That was another one of the major problems that Frank had, never being happy with who he was or where he was. He honestly wished that he could live on Mercury instead as he could have a warm and a cold place to live at, two in one, and there would be absolutely no one else there. Well maybe he would invite Gerard over every now and then.

As Pete’s house came into view Frank felt relief wash over him and he hastened his pace. The door was unlocked and as Frank was a common visitor at the Wentz household he casually trudged in. He got eye contact with Pete’s dad but as Frank was practically running by this point they didn’t get to exchange hello’s.

“Frank, hey dude,” Pete greeted him softly as Frank opened his bedroom door. “Are you okay?” He got up from the bed and walked over to his friend, who was panting heavily. Frank didn’t answer however, he was dead in a way that he couldn’t explain properly. Pete seemed to understand this as he closed his bedroom door and pulled his best friend into a smooth hug, wrapping his arms softly around his neck. Frank wrapped his arms around Pete’s waist and buried his face in the crook of his neck.

“She knows.” he whispered and felt Pete starting to rub circles on his back, something that comforted him in a mysterious sort of way. Pete had done that to him ever since they were kids, and Frank had some sort of emotional connection to it.

Silence covered the room as the two friends swayed from side to side, hugging the pain out of Frank. At times Pete could truly be one of the best friends to have. Despite talking more in one go than what the human brain could comprehend, he truly understood when you were supposed to be quiet. He was probably one of the most annoying human beings on Earth and most people wouldn’t believe that he understood others, but Pete had a deep understanding for people, he just never showed it to anyone other than Frank.

But it didn’t bother him in the slightest, Pete was there to comfort him and that was all he needed.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“Frank,” a voice whispered from somewhere, and the teen groggily answered with an annoyed ‘yes’. “I’ve made us some waffles. You need to eat something, even if it’s in the morning and I just woke you the fuck up from your slumber.”

Frank opened his eyes to see Pete standing over him, shirtless with a tray in his hands. He couldn’t see what was on the tray but it was most likely a mountain of waffles and sugar, jam, whipped cream and something for the two to drink. He was almost sure as hell that there were no cutlery on there as it was a tradition for the two to eat with their hands - something they did when they were younger.

“You didn’t have to,” Frank’s raspy morning voice sounded horrible, but he couldn’t really care less. “I was just a little sad, that’s all.” He sat up against the wall, and Pete carefully crawled into the bed. Just as Frank had speculated there was no cutlery in sight.

“I honestly don’t give a fuck if you were just a little sad or not because you are my best friend and you didn’t feel too good yesterday and now I want this day to be better,” he sat down against the wall as well, almost spilling some of the juice from their glasses in the process. “Sundays are boring as fuck, that we can all agree on, but now I want to make this our day. I was also really craving waffles this morning and to my surprise we had some waffle mix, which I'm glad about. In bad times there is always some light somewhere, even if you are locked up in a basement with fat rats crawling around you.” Frank giggled a little, and the two friends dug into the food.

It took them about two hours before they were fully done with eating, and Pete may or may not have spilled some whipped cream on himself making everything way more sexual. Frank did admittedly have a hard time not to stare at his friend’s chest, especially after his - maybe - newfound liking to boys. Pete was no doubt well trained and quite attractive, even Frank had to agree on that, and being shirtless certainly didn’t help his case. He didn't notice Frank’s uncomfortableness however as he was too busy eating the delicious waffles and talking about how hot a _certain someone_ was, something that Frank was inevitably thankful for.

“Okay but today I was thinking,” Pete said and sucked the grease off of his fingers, something more that bothered Frank in the slightest. “We could spend time with each other - of course. Maybe we could play some games like whatever the fuck you want to play, we can play like some good ol’ classic games like Monopoly or some else like Crash Bandicoot on my ol’ PS2. We should totally play an old Crash game, can’t we can’t we?” Excitement was shining in his brown eyes, and Frank smiled.

“I guess so, I don’t have any other suggestions so why the fuck not.”

The two friends spend the rest of the day playing video games and chatting about everything and nothing. Pete came up with a new compliment to give to Mikey when he saw him the next time (“you’re called Mikey Way because you’re as beautiful as the Milky Way”) and Frank realized how obsessed his best friend had turned. Mikey wasn’t _that_ hot - his brother was hotter - and Pete had been talking about him a little more than what he used to talk about the people he wanted to hook up with. It was mildly interesting to listen to, but as Frank was trying to come to terms with what he was it was harder to ignore the envy growing inside of him.

Pete had always been the more popular one of them. He was the one who got all the support from others, the one who everyone were interested in. Frank was the second choice, if you didn’t get Pete you would move on over to Frank. He had gotten a few girls after him, but most of the times they lost interest in him once they realized he was nothing like the dream boy they once had chased after. They were usually stuck-up bitches anyways who just wanted him to fuck them, and it was understandable that Pete decided to ignore them. He may like to have sex with anyone, but he hated whenever people would kind of sell themselves to him. It was the game of flirting with them that he found to be fascinating and even Frank had to admit it was fun to watch.

The evening came quicker than what either of the boys would have liked, and as it was around 9 o’clock they went downstairs to get some grub. Pete’s parents and siblings had tried to stay away from the boys the whole day as not to be in the way for their special day, and when they came downstairs his parents went upstairs - as his siblings already were upstairs. They wished the boys a good night and Mrs. Wentz gave them both a kiss on the cheek. It made Frank warm inside, knowing that someone cared in the slightest about him, someone that wasn’t Pete.

“You wanna see something super cool I managed to do with my powers yesterday?” Pete asked as he hopped onto the island counter next to Frank as they waited for the microwaved pizza to turn warm. Frank nodded carefully as he glanced over to the opened door, just to make sure that neither of his friend’s parents suddenly would walk in on them- and now Frank’s mind transported itself somewhere else entirely.

Pete grinned as he twisted his body so not only his head was facing Frank, but also his upper body - which not to mention still was distractingly shirtless. He focused intensely on his right hand as he placed it in between their faces, and with a snap to his fingers a fire was lit at the tip of his index finger. The flames danced around his finger, almost managing to catch the tip of Frank’s fringe in the process.

“I can lit my hand on fire, but I restricted it to my index finger,” Pete said happily. He snapped his fingers again and the flame went up into oblivion. “But hands are the only part of me which I can control, the rest of the body is up for training somewhere where I won’t set everything on fire. I actually managed to burn down a whole plant! It was scary but fucking amazing, just think what I can do when I expand my powers even more, it’s so fucking cool! Man I never thought I could be happy with my powers, but for once I’m actually kinda proud of myself.”

“That’s great,” Frank said quietly and smiled softly. “As you demonstrated this however I wanted to try my powers as well, and I may have heard you thinking about this certain tall, awkward, blond, Mutant boy.” Pete gasped loudly as he smacked his hand against his chest, trying his best to look offended.

“Frank Anthony Iero, did you read my thoughts?” He said in an attempt at trying to sound like an old lady. “I am offended, this is unacceptable. One second I’m trying to show you what I have learned and in the other you are reading my thoughts. I thought we were friends, but alas, I guess not!” He placed the back of his other hand against his forehead and tilted his head backwards in another attempt and trying to seem dramatic.

Frank laughed lightly and tried to focus on Pete’s thoughts again - just to fuck with him. But his friend was a step ahead, and as Frank heard the faint beginning of Pete’s thoughts his face went beetroot red. “Pete, bad thoughts! God do you really wish for that? It’s so detailed, how many times haven’t you gotten your dick sucked?”

Pete was laughing hysterically at him, clutching his stomach as his face was pulled up into a huge grin. He was laughing so hard that he was silent. “You- you should have seen your face! You’re blushing so bad right now, this is hilarious!” Frank wasn’t nearly as impressed however, and he punched Pete’s arm weakly. He was never known for being the strongest person anyways.

After Pete had gathered his senses the two boys ate their pizzas. They fell back into normal conversation and casually chatted about how tasty pizza was. When the two boys went back to bed together Frank had a smile on his face. Sundays were never days that he liked as he knew what would come the next day and all he could do was to wait for it to come. Pete had however turned it into a wonderful day, no wonder why people kept on saying that he was a great host at parties that Frank never attended because he really hated parties.

They didn’t go to bed immediately, of course, but they stayed up to about 2 am before they decided to sleep. Or well Pete wanted to sleep because he was supposed to have a game tomorrow and really needed to be well rested - which he wouldn’t be anyways - while Frank decided to stay up for a little while longer. He was however also put under sleep by the watchful eye of Mr. Sandman half an hour later, and he fell asleep with Pete’s bare chest pressed against his back. No homo, of course.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Monday morning was hell to Frank. He got asked by Pete’s parents as to why he was staying at their house and not at his own, and there was no way in hell that he would ever tell them why. So he made up a shitty excuse about how he had some fight with his mother - which at least was true - and Pete had invited him to stay because Frank felt too bad about going back home. He promised that he would go home and talk to his mother after school, even if he really didn’t feel like doing that at all.

But not only that he felt personally attacked by their questions, Pete was still shirtless and it distracted him. It helped when he put on a shirt, but it was after they had eaten and Frank had already managed to spill food on both himself and the table. He got to borrow clothes from Pete - some black skinny jeans and a t-shirt with a Metallica logo on it - and thankfully the two of them were about the same size. Not only did Frank spill food however, he also got to know that Pete had now refrained from being a vegetarian after trying to be one for about two years as he said that he needed the proteins in the meat, and now Frank felt alone in his vegetarian hell.

As a little cherry on the fucking ice-cream he got to know that no, he was not getting a ride by Pete, because that space had been occupied by Mikey fucking Way. Of course the all mighty and noble Pete had to be oh so nice to his new little boy toy and give him a ride to school. That meant that Frank either had to take the bus, walk or go by bike. There was no way that he would take that damn walk to school and the bikes the Wentz family owned were mountain bikes that was designed for Pete. That left him with the option of taking the bus, which itself was filled to the brim with disgusting kids his own age. If he was lucky enough he could get a place where no one else sat, and that was likely to happen as Pete’s stop was quite far away from the school.

“You know, I could say that other plans came up and give you a ride instead,” Pete proposed as he rummaged through one of the boxes in the hall, trying to search after the spare helmet. “It’s not everything in the world, I could give him a ride another day.” He found the helmet and stood up, placing it under his arm.

“It’s okay, dude,” Frank said where he stood in front of the hallway mirror. “I can handle taking the fucking bus, it’s only people that’s the problem anyways.” He usually got to ride with Bob, but apparently Pete wasn’t the only one who was getting to hook up with someone and Bob was suspecting that he would get to sleep with this one girl any second now. So, Frank who would then call Pete to give him a ride, was also unavailable. He did offer to give him a ride, but Frank didn’t want to be too much of a burden as he already had been.

“You sure?” Pete asked worryingly, eyebrows scrunched into a frown.

“Yes, oh my god, someday I’ll eventually have to take the bus anyways,” Frank muttered and brushed some strands of hair away from his eyes. “What’s the worst that could happen? Other than millions of scenarios that I am able to think of in my head and now this suddenly became a whole lot worse wow man I am screwed. But to hell with that, l am an independent little emo who shall face the disgusting thing we call humans.” He smiled, a fake one, but he tried to keep up a façade. Pete could easily see through it however, and unimpressed, he raised on an eyebrow.

“Well we’re off now,” Pete said as he put on his helmet. “I’ll meet you on the bus stop by school, ‘kay?” Frank nodded at that, and the two boys said their goodbyes to Pete’s siblings and exited the house. They parted ways as Frank left for the bus stop and Pete for his motocross bike. He watched as his friend drove away like the speed freak he was, and Frank smiled warmly as he remembered the feeling of the wind hitting his face, making his hair go wild. He really enjoyed going on trips with Pete’s motocross bike, that purchase was the best he’d ever done.

The school bus came into view not too long after, and Frank glared at the tired bus driver as he stepped on. She glared back at him, and the teen rolled his eyes before he sat down in an empty seat. He sat in the window seat and placed his bag on the seat next to him, just to make sure no one would feel particularly social and start a conversation with him. Earbuds were plugged into his ears which meant that there was no socializing for him to be done.

The bus stopped at its assigned stops, and Frank felt the irritation building up inside of him for each time it stopped to pick up yet another bunch of disgusting kids. When it came to yet another stop, Frank sighed heavily and shifted in his seat. Just as he did that he managed to catch a glimpse of red hair and he stopped in his movements. The familiar face of Gerard Way came into view and Frank felt his heart skip an extra beat.

Gerard noticed the teen and smiled at him, which admittedly made Frank blush in the slightest. He smiled back however - probably managing to look like the Joker in the process - but it faded quickly as he saw big-fro-guy wiggling his eyebrows at them. Big-fro-guy totally didn’t ruin Frank’s mood and made him into the mini demon he was known as.

Gerard's lips moved and Frank literally ripped out one of his earbuds and gave him a questioning face. “I asked if I could sit down,” he repeated himself and smiled at the awkward emo boy. Frank, now flustered, quickly sat back down in his seat and moved on his bag so it was by his feet. The older thanked him and sat down next to him, doing the same with his bag as Frank.

“I’ve never seen you ride the bus before, says the guy who never goes by bus,” Gerard said and started to mess with his hair in an attempt at trying to make it look better. It wasn’t necessarily working but Frank thought he looked cute when he did so.

“Well my dear friend Pete Wentz decided to be a gentleman and give your brother a ride to school today,” Frank muttered and frowned. “He likes to impress the ladies and gents with his motocross bike, and now this suddenly sounds weirdly sexual ew no. Whatever, Bob couldn’t hitch me a ride because “sex!” and I didn’t want to walk nor take a damn mountain bike to school. So I ended up on this shitty bus. Why are you on the bus today then? It seemed as if you never take it.”

“My friend, Ray, his car wasn’t functioning and my other friend wouldn’t answer his phone - he oversleeps a lot - so we decided to take the bus. I hate taking the bus and try to avoid it at all costs, but I don’t have a Pete Wentz to save me from the dangers of kids my age,” Frank snickered at Gerard’s words. “But I hath found thee hither, Mr. Iero, and anon everything appears to beest better.”

Frank blinked a few times and raised on his eyebrows in confusion. “Have you turned into an alien because I’m sorry but, what the fuck did you say?”

“I was trying to say everything appears to be better now that I have found you in ‘Shakespearean’ or whatever but it may have been the most inaccurate way of saying it, ever,” Gerard laughed and Frank shook his head at the ridiculousness. “As a very sophisticated teenager I am a huge Shakespeare fan, and as a very sophisticated teenager I apparently like to lie straight up in your face.”

Frank laughed again, something he seemed to have no problem doing around Gerard. The other teen was just naturally charming, not in the way that Pete was charming, but in his own little way. He had those little quirks to him that Frank liked, and his awkward way of talking just made everything better. The fact that Gerard didn’t seem bothered by Frank’s constant glare or his negativity that apparently “sipped out him like a bad odor” made him happy, someone was actually accepting him.

The two talked enthusiastically about things for the rest of the short bus ride, mostly about music. They got into a heated argument on whether Black Flag or Misfits was the best punk band, but then realized how dumb they were over arguing about something like that as both bands were amazing. Gerard took notice to Frank’s - Pete’s - Metallica shirt underneath his - yet again Pete’s - black jeans jacket and complimented it, but also stating that punk was better than metal, something that Frank kind of agreed on. All his friends liked metal better than punk, calling Misfits for some sort of B-horror movie band which admittedly could piss him off at times.

When the bus came to the school’s bus stop Frank saw Pete standing outside, waving excitedly at him. Gerard said a bye to him and went out with his friend. Frank gathered his things and got off the bus and as fast as he had stepped a foot outside he got pulled away by someone, presumably Pete. He came face to face with his best friend, who was grinning from ear to ear.

“I am literally the best person in the entire world,” he said, and Frank blinked quizzically at him. Pete slung an arm over his friend’s shoulders and the two started to walk towards their school. “You know how I’m the god of all gods in this school, or at least with the juniors and all but other wise I am pretty much god here. But whatever, today the magnifique moi was maybe a lil’ bit early to young Mr. Way’s house and so I decided to be a gentleman and go inside. The door, to my surprise, was unlocked and so I trudged inside. Then Mikey walked into the hallway from the kitchen and apparently I scared the living shit out of him because he swore loudly at me as he dropped his phone to the floor. Then I picked it up, as the noble Prince Charming I am, and saw that he was stalking me on Instagram. But! I am nice so I decided to stay quiet about it, do you know what this means?”

Frank sighed heavily as he opened the door for them. “No, and I don’t really care either. Look here, Mikey’s just going to be yet another fuck and once you’ve slept with the guy you’re gonna be over him. Which is why I’ve decided not to give a fuck about your stories. Also I sat next to Gerard and talked to him throughout some part of the bus ride and I am literally still screaming.”

“Oh, sorry dude,” Pete apologized with a sincere voice. “But like… I actually like Mikey. Not only doesn’t he like my flirting which makes it ever the more hilarious, but he’s really cute. I’ve known him for like a week but he’s just so lanky and awkward and it makes him even cuter and I just wanna hug him and tell him that everything is okay and I just- agh,” Pete tilted his head backwards and groaned loudly, somehow cracking his neck in the process. “Okay sorry, just had to get that out of me. So you talked to your ‘man crush’ about what exactly? About how much you wanna bone the guy?”

Frank swatted his hand at Pete as a way of trying to brush off what his best friend had said. He still wasn’t comfortable about Pete mentioning his man crush - not crush it was a man crush okay. Totally a man crush. “Music, mostly. He likes punk music as well which I find to be nice. He complimented my shirt, or well your shirt and said he liked punk better than metal. He has great music taste which is one of the criterias for dating me- did I just say that I want to date the guy?” He turned to Pete with a panicked look, who only shrugged however.

“Yeah, can’t blame you however,” the two stopped as they got to their classroom and leaned against the wall next to the door. “Is it really that awful that you like a guy? No one is going to judge you for it, Frank.” He smiled weakly at him, a smile filled with sympathy. Frank didn’t like sympathy, and so he frowned at him.

“It’s not that I’m scared that someone will judge me since well you are bi and all but-" he stopped in the middle of his sentence, frustrated with himself. He didn’t really know why it was such a problem. Like he said himself no one would judge him for his dating preferences. He was best friends with Pete Wentz and everyone who was actual friends with the guy was bound to be a little gay. What bothered Frank wasn’t necessarily the fact that Gerard was a guy, but that he actually _liked_ him. There wasn’t a lot of people who managed to get on Frank’s good side and especially not after a week of knowing him. Something about Gerard was unique, unique in a way that made Frank long for him even more.

They didn’t get to continue their conversation however as their teacher arrived. The lesson went on agonizingly slow, and Frank thought that he was starting to lose his mind as he looked at the clock every other minute. Pete was working next to him - probably because he was in a good mood - but Frank just couldn’t concentrate. He had finished one single exercise in an hour, a record for him really. The next lesson wasn’t much better however, and after an hour and a half of his Biology teacher explaining stuff about cells, Frank was finally free to go to lunch.

He met up with Pete outside of the cafeteria and the two got their food. Gerard was not anywhere to be seen in the room and something in Frank seemed to deflate. It’s not like he would dare to sit next to the teen and his friends anyways, but just seeing Gerard was bound to lighten up his day.

Someone who was in the cafeteria however was the younger and less exciting brother of Gerard, and Pete whisper yelled that to Frank. Frank, being the little emo asshole he was, didn’t really care and decided to ignore his best friend. That proved to be harder than what he first thought however and before he knew it, Frank was sitting next to a short sophomore who was glaring daggers towards the two juniors. The boy, Patrick, didn’t seem to be too happy when Pete had made his appearance and sat down next to Mikey, who himself seemed to be rather taken aback.

Pete being the magnificent asshole he was didn’t give a fuck about that, and shamelessly tried to flirt with Mikey, who time after time shut him down. Frank actually found that to be rather entertaining as Pete’s face expression changed every other second depending on the response he got from Mikey. Frank also tried to open up a conversation with Patrick, and actually managed to succeed with it as the two found their common interest in Green Day.

As Frank was about to argue how When I Come Around was better than Basket Case, a loud alarming sound echoed throughout the school. The lights in the cafeteria went out, and students started to anxiously discuss the situation.

“Okay but what the fuck,” Pete asked as he scanned the room, eyebrows furrowed and eyes filled with worry. “I am not ready to die yet.” He sneakily grabbed ahold of Mikey’s arm, whose eyes were as wide as UFO’s. He seemed to be more on edge than the others, and he anxiously licked his lips as his eyes were strained at the cafeteria doors, as if he knew something was going to appear from there.

“Okay students, no need to worry,” a teacher shouted as he stood in the middle of the cafeteria. “It is just temporary things that need to be fixed, there is no need to panic-” the floor underneath him rumbled around, and stalks burst out from the floor. They wrapped their way around his legs, running up against his body as the thorns tore gashes into his skin. His screams were flooded with the others’ and students huddled into the corners of the rooms, faces terrified.

The cafeteria doors violently opened up, a gust of wind accompanying it. Frank had to squint his eyes as not to get the strong winds to hurt them. He felt Patrick’s trembling body pushing up against his back and in some way it made him feel safer, the feeling that he wasn’t alone made it a little better. That feeling was ruined however as a deep, croaky voice laughed throughout the whole from, sending students into a crazy frenzy.

“Calm down, children,” a familiar voice spoke and Frank felt his blood go cold. “There is no need to fear me, I am only here for specific people anyways.” A mist which had been formed cleared up, and the shadow of a person trudged into the room. They were dressed in casual clothes, but Frank managed to catch the sick grin on his lips.

The person stopped in front of the teacher and put his hand in front of his face. The teacher looked absolutely terrified as he was stuck to the floor by the stalks, but he was quickly put out his misery as one of the stalks holding him still made its way up to his neck and cut it. The stalk must have succeeded in cutting the jugular vein as blood immediately started to pour out of the man’s neck. Students started to scream, and Frank was close to do so as well but composed himself.

“No need to panic, just as I said, it will all be better soon.” the unknown person shouted and spun around in the room. They pulled off their hood, revealing a man with messy brown hair. Just as Frank had seen he had a psychotic smile on his face, something resembling the Joker. The man looked to be mentally unstable, eyes wide and red.

“Mutants!” He shouted as he stood in a star pose. “I have come to this school in order to make you join me. The humans you see here are fearing you, you who are like me. Our powers are neglected by the human kind, pushed away as something that is shameful to have. For years, decades, historians have documented how people like us have been treated like scum, as if we were nothing more than dust to be swept away. We have been wrongfully convicted by these beasts and for years we have let them have their way, that however is something I have wanted to change for the longest time now.

Your friends may be humans, dear Mutants, but what do they actually know about you? They only know you as the human they think you are, not as the creature you truly are hiding. Do your family really accept you? Do they really love you for the person they think you are? There is no human to be found in this world who truly can love a Mutant for being a Mutant, they only love you because you are a family member. Mutants can only love other Mutants, and humans can only love other humans. The fact that there has to be such a difference between the two of us is something that I want to end, to end in one of the more brutal ways.

I want to start a revolution! I am to be done with humans' bullshit and their way of thinking, they are to be extinguished. We Mutants have been cowering in fear for years, and it’s time to put that to a stop. We shall no longer be scared to face the day, we shall no longer accept their little schemes. People like us are killed because we are just slightly different, kids like you are being badly bullied, beaten to death because you are not who they are. All humans do is bring our race into misery, and there is no way to overcome this big difference between us other than make us the more powerful side. We must defeat people like them, humans never had a toll on us anyways. It’s time that we stand up for ourselves, that we dare to say ‘no’ to their power. We shall rise up against them, and I need your help. So to say, Mutants, are you with me?”

Frank was mesmerized. This unknown man trudged into the school, killed a teacher with his powers and asked if there was any Mutant who wanted to join him. He had no boundaries, he was going to do as he pleased, not letting people hold him back for his beliefs. Frank envied him for that, he also wanted to stand up for his race, letting humans know that he was done with their shit. He adored the unknown Mutant, someone like him was the exact man he’d prayed for to show up. Someone who finally would lead his people to success.

Out of the corner of his eye Frank saw someone walk out of the wall of people, that someone being Bob. He walked over to the unknown Mutant whose grin got bigger for each step Bob got closer to him. From the other side of the room Joe and Andy walked out from the crowd. Ryan was trying to hold Andy back, who only grunted and pushed his supposed friend away from him.

The unknown man gazed around the room and his eyes landed on Ryan, who was trembling with fear where he was an open target. As Joe and Andy had join the small circle of Mutants in the middle, the others had descended from Ryan, letting him know that they were not going to support him.

“Ah, George Ryan Ross, I see,” Mutant-man said and made a dramatic move with his right hand. “Precognition, why won’t you join me? Your power can be used for great things for our future, there is no need to fear me. I am here for your peace, for your eternal feeling of freedom. If you join my side you shall to be praised as a god, someone who made a game changing decision. I am not to be feared, at least not by people like you.” He reached out his hand in a welcoming way, but Ryan only shook his head.

“No,” his voice was trembling, but he cleared his throat as to make it steadier. “There is no need for me to kill people to get the peace I want and need. Humans will one day come to a conclusion that there is no need for war between us, and we shall be the better race and realize that it is not needed.”

Mutant-man didn’t seem to like his words as he snarled loudly and flipped his bangs of his eyes. “Ryan, I believe you have a twisted picture of how the world actually is. I pity Mutants like you, those who truly think humans would like peace between the two of us. It’s honestly ridiculous,” he sighed and turned around to the group of teenagers around him. “Ridiculous.” Stalks suddenly shot up from the ground underneath Ryan, and the boy let out a ear piercing scream as they grabbed ahold of his ankles, wrists and neck.

Mutant-man turned back around again. “I shall no longer play nice wit's you, Ryan. You and I both know that humans are scum and will backstab you, it’s pitiful. Joining me is not going to be a choice for you, just you is someone who I’ll truly need.”

More stalks made their way around Ryan’s body and he tride to fight against them. It didn’t work however as his arms were tied around his back in a matter of seconds, and his legs were tightly pushed together underneath the layers of stalks making their way around them. He was still managing to glare at Mutant-man, who was more than amazed by his own work.

“Bob, will you carry this little boy with you? He likes to think he can pick a fight with me.” Mutant-man said nonchalantly, and Bob did as he was told. He spun around the room once again, and this time he stopped so he was facing Frank. His thin lips pulled into yet another psycho grin and he clapped his hands slowly, probably as a way of trying to manipulate the teen.

“Frank, oh how I have missed you," Mutant-man said cooly, making Frank’s breath hitch. “How long ago was it? Two days? I have missed you lots, where is that red haired boy, Gerard was it? I believe he could be of great use as well, but alas, it seems as if he is not here. His not as wonderful younger brother is here though, closely pressed up against my favorite pyrokinetic. Do you like setting things on fire, Pete?” He laughed manically, and Frank glanced over to his best friend to see his face scrunched up into disgust. “No, I am only kidding with you. My main interest is on you for the moment, Frank. I know your distaste for humans is as strong as mine, so why don’t we join forces, you and I?”

He couldn’t move. Frank was unable to move a single muscle in his body. He was gripping the Metallica t-shirt so hard that he was almost sure he left holes in there. What Mutant-man had said was true, he agreed with the speech he had, but something in Frank repelled him from it. The words of Gerard echoed in his brain, almost as a sort of mantra trying to get him not to follow the man. They were trying to stop him from making the worst decision in his life, that could also however turn out to be the best decision in his life.

“Frank, what are you doing?” Pete’s worried voice came from behind Frank as he stepped away from his friends. He didn’t respond however and continued on towards the group of Mutants, which now had been joined by Bob and Ryan. Frank’s feet carried him softly over the ground almost as if he was walking on cotton candy or clouds.

“Frank.” he spun around to his right in one quick movement, and saw Gerard standing by the opening to the cafeteria. His strong voice had brought him out of his trance, and the two locked eyes. Frank felt his insides flip upside down as Gerard made his way closer towards him, face filled with worry and anger. Of course he would be pissed at Frank for following the Mutant-man, it was not the beliefs that he followed after all.

“Don’t do anything you’ll regret,” Gerard stopped a few feet away from Frank, who was torn between running over to Mutant-man or his (man) crush. “You know this man wants to kill people, he’s a maniac. His depiction of people is not true, every single human out there don’t hate Mutants. There are scum people, yes, but there are also those who do truly love you for who you are, not whether you're a human or a Mutant. They may be rare but they are there, you just need to search. Choosing to kill them won’t better the conflict between us.”

“I’m not out for being accepted,” Frank deadpanned, surprising Gerard with his front forward attitude. “I just want humans to realize that we Mutants aren’t going to take their shit any longer. I am tired of it, Gerard, I don’t want to face it every single day. There is a line for how much bullshit I can take from others, and it has been crossed by now. I am tired.”

Gerard bit his bottom lip, letting his gaze fall onto the ground. “There are people who believe in you, people like… like me. You have friends who will support you, people who love you, something to fight for. I don’t have anything, I’ve lost my whole family, but I have no resentment towards them. There is no need for holding a grudge towards someone, be the better person and grow from the people who don’t like you. You have people who support you.”

“My mom has disowned me,” at those words, Gerard looked up at the shorter boy with blank eyes, eyes filled with pain. “Saturday, I came clean about who I was. She didn’t like it. I’ve spent my weekend at Pete’s house, but his family don’t know anything about it. I am not loved, there are just people who have grown to accept me over the years.”

“Frank, please,” Gerard pleaded, taking two steps closer. “Evil has never proven to be good, there are other ways to forge a friendship between our races-”

“Like what?”

“A deceleration of friendship.”

“A fucking declaration of friendship?” Frank spat, words cutting like a knife. “It has taken many wars for opposites to finally overcome their differences and sign a fucking declaration, and maybe that’s what the Mutants need. A revolution is what we need, someone to steer us onto the right path and make us find our way home. We need this push, Gerard. This is the last plan we have, other wise we'll never be accepted.”

“Violence is never the answer-”

“Oh for fucks sake, how can you be so blind?” Frank roared and threw his arms up in the air, dramatically. “Violence has proven to be the answer to many things. It may end up with stupid ‘declaration of friendships’ but that’s because a war began. War can solve conflicts, no matter how bloody they may be, they can help tremendously. Stop being the peaceful guy and open up your eyes to realize, we live in a hellish world.”

Gerard didn't answer this time, but kept his eyes strained on the dirty floor. Frank took that as an acceptance to his opinion, and he snorted as he took the last steps towards the group of Mutants. Mutant-man patted Frank sympathetically on his back, but he only grunted and glared at him.

“Pete, will you join your best bud?” Mutant-man asked and waved with his hands. Pete however only lowered his glare to make himself appear scarier than what he actually was - which he succeeded in - and somehow managed to let out threatening snarl.

“What Frank follows is not my business,” he growled lowly. “I love the guy with all of my heart, but we all grow apart some day. We can’t always agree on the same thing, and killing people - innocent people - was never something I aimed for. Starting a revolution is hopefully never going to be necessary.” Mutant-man nodded at that, seemingly pleased with Pete’s motivation.

“Whatever floats your boat, pyro,” he shrugged carelessly. “I think I may have gotten what I needed from here. You humans can be sure to see me in a few weeks, I will not go easy on either of you. You can try to build a wall and I will still manage to get through, you can try to build an army but I will still beat it down. Westlings is my hometown, and it's going to be my first target. I expect you other Mutants to join me then, but under the meantime, sayonara.” He snapped with his fingers and a thick mist started to cover the floor.

Frank saw Mutant-man’s shadow walk through, and his feet carried him through the mist. As he passed by someone he believed to be Gerard he heard him whisper something that stung badly inside of him, almost making Frank stop in his tracks.

“I believed in you.”


End file.
